The Indian Air Force took to Twitter today debunk malicious lies being spread by Ajai Shukla, former NDTV journalist and current Business Standard columnist, in his blog about the IAF Court of Inquiry constituted to probe the helicopter crash in Srinagar on 27th February being put on hold until the elections are over.

CoI of aircraft accidents are meticulous & time consuming. All past inquiries of aircraft accidents bear testimony to this. Proceedings of a CoI are not commented upon by IAF till completion of the inquiry in all cases.There is no connection between elections & completion of CoI. — Indian Air Force (@IAF_MCC) April 27, 2019

The official Twitter handle of Indian Air Force said that Ajai Shukla had incorrectly speculated in his blog that the IAF Court of Inquiry constituted to investigate the Mi-17 V5 crash at Srinagar on 27th February has been put on hold. “This is his imagination and IAF categorically denies this”, said IAF.

IAF also said that the Court of Inquiry of aircraft accidents is meticulous and time-consuming. All past inquiries of aircraft accidents bear testimony to this. Proceedings of a Court of Inquiry are not commented upon by IAF till completion of the inquiry in all cases. There is no connection between elections and the completion of the Court of Inquiry.

Ajai Shukla had in his blog written that, “The Indian Air Force (IAF) has been told to keep on hold the findings of a “court of inquiry” (CoI) that has conclusively determined that an IAF Mi-17V5 helicopter was shot down by an Indian missile battery that was guarding Srinagar air base”.

Indian Air Force @IAF_MCC has been ordered to put on hold (until after the elections) its Court of Inquiry findings that the IAF helicopter shot down the day after the Balakot strike was downed by an IAF air defence missile in a “friendly fire” incident. https://t.co/vVsEb8sSy3 — Ajai Shukla (@ajaishukla) 27 April 2019

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In fact, even in his blog, Ajai Shukla had said that the Indian Air Force had refused to respond to these wild speculations by Ajai Shukla saying that the inquiry is still in progress and the time span taken for a Court of Inquiry to reach a conclusion cannot be predicted.

It is evident that Ajai Shukla went ahead with his wild theories connecting the Indian Air Force’s Court of Inquiry proceedings to the ongoing 2019 elections being connected in order to insinuate that the government had something to hide about the operations that were carried out post the Pulwama terror attack and the events that took place after the Balakot airstrikes where Pakistan attempted to breach our borders. Ajai Shukla, after the Pulwama terror attack, was more concerned about Prime Minister Modi ‘benefitting’ from the terror attack rather than the terror being unleashed by Pakistan on India and the families of the martyrs.

This blatant lie, in fact, was also furthered by other so-called journalists.

The very journalists who have been quick to doubt the government of India as far as the Balakot airstrikes were concerned furthered this lie by Ajai Shukla. Among the people who furthered this lie was Krishan Pratap Singh and Abhisar Sharma.