Ex-COAS rubbishes Cong claims, Lt Gen Hooda says cross border operations were carried out

New Delhi, May 04: The Congress' claims of surgical strikes during its tenure has added a new diamension to the ongoing political discourse and now the former Army Officers are also speaking about the issue.

Congress leader Rajiv Shukla, while claiming that the UPA government had carried out six surgical strikes between 2008 and 2014, had given out the dates of the surgical strikes.

Former chief of Army staff and Minister of State for External Affairs General VK Singh on Saturday responded to Congress's claims that six surgical strikes had been carried out during the UPA tenure and accused the Congress of lying.

"Call it surgical strikes, call it cross border operations, they have been carried out in the past by the Army. I am not aware of exact dates and areas that have been brought out," Lt General (Retd) DS Hooda, former Northern Command Chief, told the media today.

Giving out the dates, Shukla had on Thursday claimed that the first strike was conducted on June 19, 2008, in Bhattal Sector in Jammu and Kashmir's Poonch. The second was conducted from August 30-September 1, 2011, in the Sharda sector across the Neelam River Valley in Kel. He said that a third surgical strike took place on January 6, 2013, at Sawan Patra Checkpost; another on July 27 and July 28, 2013, at Nazapir Sector; a fifth one on August 6, 2013 at Neelam Valley; and the sixth one on January 14, 2014.

In his tweet, General VK Singh said, "Congress has a habit of lying. Will you please let me know which 'So called Surgical Strike' are you attributing to my tenure as COAS. Am sure you must have hired some Coupta to invent another story."