india

Updated: May 02, 2019 17:50 IST

India conducted “six surgical strikes” across the border into Pakistan between 2008 and 2014. Congress leader Rajiv Shukla made this revelation at a press conference in New Delhi.

During the press conference, Shukla went on to list the dates when the strikes were carried out.

The first strike, according to the dates Rajiv Shukla gave out, 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, ANI quoted him as saying.

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.

This is not the first time that the Congress has said that surgical strikes were conducted during the UPA tenure. However, this is the first time that exact dates have been given out by the Congress for the surgical strikes that it claims were carried out during the UPA tenure.

Shukla’s revelations come close on the heels of former prime minister Manmohan Singh saying in an exclusive interview to Hindustan Times that multiple surgical strikes had taken place during his tenure as PM.

“...our armed forces were always given a free hand to operationally respond to every threat. 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,” former PM Manmohan Singh said in the interview.

The UPA was in power between 2004 and 2014. Before this, the Atal Behari Vajpayee-led NDA government had ruled between 1999 and 2004.

Of late, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during his election rallies, has been mentioning the recent air strikes on a Jaish-e-Mohammad camp at Balakot in Pakistan after the February 14 Pulwama suicide bombing. This has not gone down too well with the Congress which has often claimed that surgical strikes were conducted during its tenure as well.