Major General Asif Ghafoor, Director General (DG) of the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the media wing of the Pakistan Armed Forces, in a press conference on Friday claimed that the Pulwama Terror Attack was “staged” by India.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WKrf_40L_Q]

Ghafoor claimed that India has blamed Pakistan for these “staged” incidents “whenever Pakistan is moving towards stability or some important event is to take place”.

“Whenever there is supposed to be an important event in Pakistan, or the country is moving towards stability, then there is always some sort of staged incident in either India or occupied Kashmir,” the DG ISPR said.

Ghafoor also remarked that certain Indian political analysts on social media have opined that Narendra Modi may attempt to escalate matters with Pakistan to help with his re-election bid. He said, “You are on social media as well, there are many Indians who have predicted such kind of an attack many months ago. That election campaigns are on, the possibility of such attacks have been mentioned in their social media.

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It can be said with almost absolute certainty that Ghafoor was referring to tweets by Ashok Swain, a professor based in Sweden who is immensely popular and has great credibility in Indian liberal circles. As we had reported earlier, Swain had tweeted in December last year that the NDA government could trigger a conflict with Pakistan to reap electoral benefits ahead of the General Elections. In another tweet, he had claimed that the Kargil conflict was a ‘set up’ by the Vajpayee government. His tweets were picked up by Pakistani mainstream media and they had reported heavily on it.

Intriguingly, during his press conference, Ghafoor made a passing comment that appeared to be a repetition of the claims made in the incendiary caste analysis report of the martyrs by Ajaz Ashraf of The Caravan. He said, “You should also consider the class composition of the soldiers who were killed in the attack.” One could be an ostrich and argue that Ghafoor said class and not caste but its pretty clear what his insinuations were behind the remark.

Earlier today, we had reported how fueling caste division within our country has always been a Jihadist plot to destabilize our country. We had also mentioned that Ajaz Ashraf’s report could have been possibly published with that end in mind. After Pakistan’s comments where they made similar insinuations to that made in The Caravan report, one can only about the loyalties of Indian mainstream media.

Not only that, but Ghafoor also cited the video of the terrorist’s parents, which was widely reported by the Indian media, where it was insinuated that Adil Dar turned terrorist because of maltreatment by the Army. He said, “He was under arrest in 2017, security forces maltreated him, there is a video message by his parents as well. Please see that to realize how he was forced into a situation where he resorted to such a violent response.”

Ghafoor picked up the “minorities under threat” bogey as well. He stated, “You (India) are a secular nation. Then why have circumstances been created where minorities are hurt? After the Pulwama attack, what happened to Muslims and Kashmiris in India? This is not being secular.”

Ignoring the obvious irony of an Islamic state representative lecturing India about secularism, it is quite obvious from Ghafoor’s comments that Pakistan has been following Indian media outlets for new fictional narratives to attack India with. One wonders at this point the extent to which India has been infiltrated by Pakistani assets. It is certainly a matter of concern that after an Indian media outlet publishes a report that could hurt the integrity of the Indian Armed Forces, the Pakistani toe the exact same line in their press conference the very next day.