First surgical strike happened in September 2016, confirms top Indian Army commander

Amid growing debate over the ‘other surgical strikes’ in the UPA era, the Indian Army made a statement that will have far-reaching effect in near future. During a media interaction, GOC-in-Chief Northern Command Lt Gen Ranbir Singh said that, “Few days ago DGMO said in a reply to an RTI that the first surgical strike happened in Sep 16', I don't want to go into what political parties say, they'll be given an answer by government. What I told you is a statement of fact.”

In simple terms, this would be inferred as what Modi government has been saying all along – there were no surgical strikes before 2014.

“Multiple surgical strikes took place during our tenure, too. For us, military operations were meant for strategic deterrence and giving a befitting reply to anti-India forces than to be used for vote garnering exercises. In the past 70 years, a government in power never had to hide behind the valour of our armed forces. Such attempts to politicize our forces are shameful and unacceptable,” former prime minister Manmohan Singh had said in an interview to The Hindustan Times.

"Compromise on India’s National Security is unacceptable. 40 of our brave CRPF soldiers were martyred in the Pulwama terror attack at the most secure National Highway in the country. This is a grave intelligence and national security failure. Since then, it has come out that CRPF and BSF were requesting for airlifting the soldiers but the Modi Government refused it. Government also ignored solid intelligence inputs from J&K police about an IED attack, besides turning a blind eye to a video warning of a terrorist organization," he said during the interview.

GOC-in-Chief Northern Command, Lt Gen Ranbir Singh also added that, “during this year we have been able to neutralize 86 terrorists so far & our operations continue in the same manner. Nearly 20 of them have been apprehended, we've also been able to bring back many of them to the mainstream.”