Not hurt by comparison with General Dyer, says Army chief

He may have been compared with the notorious General Dyer of Jallianwala Bagh infamy, but Army Chief General Bipin Rawat is unfazed by the description.

"See, I am an Army officer, just anything cannot affect me. You have to be prepared to face such.... People can misinterpret (comments made by him)," General Rawat told IANS in an interaction.

He was asked about academician Partha Chatterjee comparing him with General Dyer, who ordered firing at a crowd of protesters at Jallianwala Bagh of Amritsar on April 13, 1919, in which 379 people were killed.

"There is no need to react. He (Chatterjee) was trying to draw a reaction from somewhere else. It should not bother me," the General said.

Asked if he was not hurt by the comparison, he said: "Not at all".

He added that people should be left to judge.

"People are the best judges; majority's decision will be right," he said.

(Anjali Ojha can be reached at anjali.o@ians.in and V.S. Chandrasekar at chandru.v@ians.in)

--IANS

ao-vsc/hs/rn