Sharing surgical strikes video not in national interest: Former Army chief

New Delhi, Oct 5: Amid demands from certain quarters for sharing footage of the surgical strikes across the LoC, former Army Chief General J.J. Singh (retd) said sharing the footage would not be in the national interest.

The former Army chief told IANS that soldiers are not supposed to leave any evidence behind after a surgical strike, and though they would have recordings of the operation, it is not in the national interest to share it with the public.

"I want to tell it loud and clear these are secret and discreet operations which are supposed to be executed with precision, and our people are supposed to come back leaving as far as possible no evidence behind," Singh told IANS.

"In today's age there is enough electronic equipment to track and record to tell what they have achieved, but it is not in national interest to put it in public domain. It has never been done in the past. In fact it is not even supposed to be talked about. We must be mature enough as a country to be able to ensure that this kind of pressure is not put on government or army to produce videos," the former Army chief told IANS.

He questioned if those insisting on sharing evidence are "listening to Pakistan".

"What are we talking about? Trying to believe what Pakistan has said? Don't we know they kept denying Osama bin Laden was there... In Kargil war they said there are no Pakistani soldiers and they were actually Pakistan light infantry battalion. What are we talking, even the people of Pakistan have stopped believing them..." he said.

Singh added that the statement by Army on the strike is "unquestionable".

The surgical strikes were carried out by Indian forces in the backdrop of the September 18 terror attack on an army camp in Uri town of Jammu and Kashmir in which 17 Indian soldiers were martyred. Two more soldiers succumbed to injuries later.

Pakistan has claimed that no surgical strikes took place.

In India, some political leaders, including Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam have said that the government should release evidence of the strike.

IANS