LoC killings: The problem with Antony's statement

A look at how Antony's statement works in favour of Pakistan

Opposition leaders have taken strong objection to Defence Minister A.K. Antony’s statement on the killing of 5 Indian soldiers at Poonch on the Line of Control. The heart of the controversy relates to the first of his three-paragraph statement

This is what the first para says: “A patrol of the Indian Army comprising one Non-Commissioned Officer and five Other Ranks was ambushed on our side of the Line of Control in Punch sector of J&K early morning on August 6,2013. In the ensuing firefight, five Indian soldiers were martyred and one soldier was injured. The ambush was carried out by approximately 20 heavily armed terrorists along with persons dressed in Pakistani army uniforms.”  We have put the most controversial parts in bold for emphasis.

A little while before Antony made this statement in Parliament, the Press Information Bureau (Defence Wing) had something very different to say in a press release issued from Jammu: “A patrol of Indian Army comprising one Non-commissioned Officer and five Other Ranks was ambushed by a Pak Border Action Team close to the Line of Control in Punch Sector of J&K early morning on 06 August 2013. In the ensuing firefight, five Indian soldiers were martyred. The ambush was carried out by approximately 20 heavily armed terrorists along with soldiers of Pak Army.” We have put some parts of the statement in bold to highlight where the two statements differ.

(Read the full statement below)
 
According to the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Arun Jaitley, the defence minister made two crucial changes to the first version, presumably sent out by the Indian Army. First of all, Antony changed “close to the Line of Control” to “on our side of the Line of Control.” Secondly, he changed “soldiers of the Pak Army” to “persons dressed in Pakistani Army uniforms.” According to Jaitley, the two changes put together give the Pakistani Army enough reason to argue that they were not involved since by the Indian defence minister’s own statement, the ambush  happened well within Indian territory and the attackers were terrorists, possibly home-grown, even if some were dressed in the uniform of the Pakistani Army.

Antony’s defence so far has been to say that his statement is based on “confirmed reports received till the time I made the statement… At this stage we don’t want to jump to any conclusion… India is a responsible country.”

There are only two ways of interpreting Antony’s statement. One, based on the evidence he has, he really believes there is a possibility that this was indeed the action of terrorists without the direct involvement of the Pakistani Army. Two, even though the defence minister knows that the Pakistani Army may be involved, he wants to preserve the nascent peace initiatives undertaken after Nawaz Sharif became the Prime Minister of Pakistan and wants to keep the LOC temperature down, especially since the Pakistani Army may be trying to scuttle the peace moves.

In either case, a multitude of other questions follow. First of all, his statement is emphatic that there were “20 armed terrorists.” How is the defence minister sure that they were NOT Pakistani Army regulars without their uniform, a tactic that the Pakistani Army used during the Kargil war? Does that not amount to “jumping to a conclusion”? While it seems that the lack of uniform is sufficient evidence for the Defence Minister to call some of the attackers terrorists, the presence of uniform is not sufficient evidence to call some other attackers Pakistani soldiers.

Is it that the defence minister knows something more that he has not shared with Parliament? In that case, he needs to come clean and take at least the leaders of the opposition into confidence.

If, on the other hand, the defence minister is merely trying to preserve the nascent peace process, even while knowing that the Paksitani Army is opposed to it, then he and Foreign Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid are on a fool’s errand. As long as the Pakistani Army is not on board, incidents like this will keep happening until their scale becomes so large that as in the case of the Parliament attack or the Mumbai attack, peace moves die a natural death.

See below for PIB statement

 
PRESS INFORMATION BUREAU (DEFENCE WING) 
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA 
PRESS RELEASE

PAK BORDER ACTION TEAM ATTACKED INDIAN SOLDIERS CLOSE TO THE LINE OF CONTROL IN PUNCH SECTOR OF J&K

Jammu : 06 Aug 2013

A patrol of Indian Army comprising of one Non Commissioned Officer and five Other Ranks was ambushed by a Pak Border Action Team close to the Line of Control in Punch Sector of J&K early morning on 06 August 2013. In the ensuing firefight, five Indian soldiers were martyred. The ambush was carried out by approximately 20 heavily armed terrorists along with soldiers of Pak Army.

This action is a likely consequence of frustrations of the terrorists' tanzeeems and Pak Army due to successful elimination of 19 hardcore terrorists in the recent months of July and August along the Line of Control and in the hinterland of J&K. The effective counter infiltration grid on the Line of Control has ensured 17 infiltration bids foiled this year resulting in killing of a total of 13 hardcore Pak trained terrorists. The numbers of such attempts have doubled this year in comparison to the corresponding period of 2012. Pak Army's desperation is also evident in the substantial increase in the number of Cease Fire Violations this year. There have been 57 Cease Fire Violations this year which is almost 80% more than the violations last year.

(S N Acharya)
Offg PRO (Defence) Jammu
0191 - 2578963 
PRO/Jammu/425/Aug /2013