NEW DELHI: Indian Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar told a closed-door meeting of opposition MPs that cross-LoC strikes by the Indian military had taken place in the past as well, only this time the government chose to go public for a strategic reason, which he did not state, reports said on Wednesday.

“Professionally done, target-specific, limited-calibre counterterrorist operations have been carried out across the LoC in the past too, but this is for the first time that the government has made it public,” Mr Jaishankar was quoted by unnamed sources as saying at the briefing on Tuesday.

Opposition Congress party on Wednesday highlighted the closed-door remarks claiming the army had carried out “target-specific, limited-calibre, counterterrorist operations” across the LoC in the past too. The Congress wants to “expose” the BJP and Modi government’s “lie” about the recent claims of first-time surgical strikes.

The party’s chief spokesman Randeep Surjewala hoped that Mr Jaishankar would not get “axed” like his predecessor Sujatha Singh for “speaking the truth” and “exposing BJP’s deception”.

His tweets came a day after the parliamentary panel was told that the army had carried out operations across the LoC in the past too, but this was for the first time that the government had gone public about it.

The information given by Mr Jaishankar to the Parliamentary Committee on External Affairs was at variance with claims made by Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar. Mr Jaishankar made the remarks when specifically asked by MPs whether surgical strikes had been carried out in the past. The top official’s comments assume significance in the context of remarks by Mr Parrikar last week rejecting Congress’ claims that surgical strikes were undertaken during the UPA government too, reports said.

They observed that Mr Parrikar had claimed it was the first time that surgical strikes had taken place in the aftermath of the Uri terrorist attack and what was undertaken previously were operations locally executed by commanders without involving the government. Mr Jaishankar, according to reports, did not use the phrase ‘surgical strikes’ in his briefing.

Pakistan has denied there were any surgical strikes on September 29 in Azad Kashmir, but now it may have to respond to fresh claims that routine operations had been happening across the LoC for some time.

Published in Dawn October 20th, 2016