
'Asim Munir spewed venom against Hindus weeks before Pahalgam attack': CDS Gen Chauhan exposes Pakistani army chief
NEW DELHI: Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Anil Chauhan on Tuesday exposed Pakistani army chief General Asim Munir's communally charged statements against India and Hindus in weeks leading up to the
Pahalgam terror attack
.
"Pakistani army chief Gen Asim Munir spewed venom against India and Hindus just weeks before what happened in Pahalgam," he said.
Talking about Pakistan's policy of supporting terrorism, he said, "Our adversary's approach is to bleed India by a thousand cuts".
Munir had stirred controversy by invoking the two-nation theory—the ideological basis of Pakistan's formation—urging citizens to instill in their children a sense of distinction from Hindus.
He further intensified rhetoric by describing Kashmir as Pakistan's "jugular vein."
Days after Pahalgam terror attack, a similar statement was made by Munir when he said, "The two-nation theory was based on the fundamental belief that Muslims and Hindus are two separate nations, not one. Muslims are distinct from Hindus in all aspects of life – religion, customs, traditions, thinking and aspirations."
Pahalgam terror attack took place on April 22 in which 26 people were killed. The incident led to the launch of Operation Sindoor, in which, the armed forces targeted nine terror sites in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


Indian Express
29 minutes ago
- Indian Express
‘Countries we visited wanted to know Trump's role (in ceasefire) … Our sense is no one took the claims seriously': Sanjay Jha
The panel of MPs that visited Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore to articulate India's stand on the Pahalgam terror attack and its aftermath returned to India late Tuesday night. JD(U) working president and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Jha who led the panel speaks about the matters raised at the meetings with the representatives of these countries and what their response was. Excerpts: What was the experience of your five-nation tour on behalf of the government? It was a great experience. Because it was a multi-party delegation, there was a very warm welcome wherever we went. People appreciated that MPs coming from the length and breadth of the country and cutting across party lines were putting forth the nation's stand on terrorism and India's right to defend itself. Representatives of some of these countries would even joke about our otherwise adversarial engagements in Parliament. But they appreciated that the delegation was carrying the message of 140 crore Indians speaking together on this issue. When we were talking about how the Indian economy had become the fourth-largest in one of the meetings, the Japanese ambassador even joked that we were talking about surpassing his country. What did you articulate on Pakistan-sponsored terrorism? Pakistan was completely exposed as a propagator of cross-border terrorism. In all our meetings, we would recite Pakistan Army chief Asim Munir's statement on Kashmir before the Pahalgam attack. We underlined how an Army chief was speaking in such a radicalised manner. Then we talked about The Resistance Force (TRF) and it claiming responsibility for the (Pahalgam) attack. We showed evidence of its links with Pakistan. We flagged how Pakistan got a UN reference of the TRF withdrawn, highlighting its links with the organisation. We also spoke about Pakistan's involvement in the 26/11 attacks and all the evidence Ajmal Qasab's capture produced. We also spoke about Pakistan being on the grey list of the FATF (Financial Action Task Force) between 2018 and 2022, and sought support from the country representatives to put it back on the list at the next FATF meeting. We told them not to compare India and Pakistan as the latter is a sponsor of terrorism. We told them to keep in perspective where we stand on democracy and economy and where Pakistan is, a nation run by the Army. What was the response from these countries? There was universal condemnation of terrorism wherever we went. Country representatives also expressed sympathy for India on the fact that it had suffered terror for so long. Interestingly, no one questioned our calibrated response to the Pahalgam terror attack. No one asked why we struck inside Pakistan. It conveyed their understanding that we have the right to defend ourselves. They were more interested in knowing how we conducted Operation Sindoor with such precision. How did the Muslim-majority countries, Malaysia and Indonesia, respond? In Indonesia and Malaysia, we told country representatives that Pakistan keeps bringing resolutions against India in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) meetings. Since we are not part of the OIC, we told them to consider our point of view as well before entertaining such resolutions. Indonesia agreed. But Malaysia did not make any commitment. We also felt a tilt towards Pakistan in Malaysia. Did the countries you visited have any questions to ask? Their questions ranged from nuclear conflict precipitation and how the ceasefire was achieved to concerns about tourism in India in the wake of the Pahalgam attack. On the ceasefire, they wanted to know US President Donald Trump's role. We told them whenever a conflict happens anywhere in the world, countries make phone calls. It does not mean they mediate peace. We told them that during the Russia-Ukraine conflict even PM Narendra Modi spoke to leaders in both countries. It did not necessarily mean he was mediating in their affairs. Our sense from the conversations was that people had not taken Trump's claims very seriously. We gave them evidence of how the first call for a ceasefire was made by Pakistan. Indonesia and Malaysia had questions on whether tourism in India was safe. We told them India is a huge country, and people were still coming in droves, even to Pahalgam. Country representatives also had questions on the Indus Waters Treaty. We told them water and blood cannot flow together and that the preamble of the treaty mentioned 'friendship and cooperation', which was not there anymore. But, largely we argued that in the last few years India had requested to renegotiate the treaty due to climate change, demographic change, etc, but Pakistan was not responding. We also said that if Pakistan stops terrorism, the treaty can be looked at positively. There were questions on the escalation breaching the nuclear threshold. We told them our response never factored in reaching the nuclear threshold. We told them we have a no-first-use policy. But we made it clear that we would not tolerate Pakistan's nuclear blackmail. We also conveyed India's new normal of treating every terrorist attack as an act of war. How did the panel spend its free time? There was no free time. We were packed from 9 am to 9 pm. Sometimes we caught late-night flights and had morning meetings in another country. We met members of parliament, think tank representatives, ambassadors of different countries and the Indian diaspora, apart from media interactions.


News18
36 minutes ago
- News18
'Brilliantly Chosen Name': In US, Shashi Tharoor Says India's Operation Sindoor Avenged Blood
Last Updated: Shashi Tharoor, leading an all-party delegation in the US, praised India's 'Operation Sindoor', calling it a symbolic and strategic response to the Pahalgam terror attack. Praising India's counter-terrorism strikes against Pakistan, Shashi Tharoor, in the United States, said 'Operation Sindoor' was a 'brilliantly chosen name" and noted that the colour of the ' sindoor ' (vermilion) is not very different from the colour of the blood. Speaking at the National Press Club in the US, Tharoor said, 'Operation Sindoor, actually, I thought was a brilliantly chosen name. ' Sindoor ', in case some Americans obviously don't know about this, is a vermilion mark that is applied to the centre of the forehead of married women in the Hindu tradition. It's widely practised." 'Some non-Hindus do it too, but more for decorative purposes, but strictly speaking, the ' sindoor ' is applied at the time of the marriage ceremony and is worn every day thereafter by married women." 'So, we were very conscious of these brutal terrorists who, by the way, shot men in front of their wives and children but spared the women and when one wife screamed out, 'Kill me too', she was told, no, you go back and tell them what we've done," the Congress MP said. 'That was why the women were spared, it was a horrendous, horrendous act. That ' sindoor ' had essentially been wiped off the foreheads of 26 Indian women, 26 I was gonna say Hindu women, but one of them actually was a Christian, but the ' sindoor ' had been wiped off the rest by these terrorists, and so we wanted first of all, to avenge that act of wiping off the ' sindoor '," Tharoor said. 'But, secondly, it's no accident that the colour of the ' sindoor ' is bright vermilion red, which is not far from the colour of blood, and in many ways there is a Hindi expression which says ' khoon ka badla khoon ' (a bloody revenge for someone's killing). Here it was ' sindoor ka badla khoon ', that is, blood in response to what they have done to the ' sindoor '," he added. Tharoor is leading the all-party delegation to the US. The delegation is visiting key global capitals as part of the government's big diplomatic outreach to highlight its stand on terrorism following 'Operation Sindoor'. During the interaction, Tharoor was asked about the number of aircraft India lost in the conflict with Pakistan, to which he responded, 'We're not military folks, and our military is the only ones who really keep track of all of these things." 'But, I think the important message that came out was whatever may or may not have happened in the course of a conflict, neither side, by the way, talks about losses very much, and that's partially because you know very well that operational details are very closely held with the senior military people," Tharoor said. 'But, I can tell you one thing, whatever may or may not have happened, what turned out to be the last night of the conflict, when India not only effectively struck 11 airfields of the Pakistani military, but there are commercially available, publicly available satellite pictures showing the extensive damage done," he added. 'There have been craters on the runway, there have been operational command centers that have been busted by these Indian bombs, and just yesterday, the Pakistanis publicly admitted that Indian strikes were so wide-ranging and effective they struck from as far as Hyderabad in South Pakistan to Peshawar in the northwest," Tharoor said. 'So, it looks very clear that whatever damage the Pakistanis believe they may have inflicted on India, it wasn't sufficient to prevent India from inflicting such extensive damage on Pakistan. So, they decided to request us to stop, which we were very happy to do," he added. The delegation led by Tharoor includes Shambhavi Chaudhary (Lok Janshakti Party), Sarfaraz Ahmed (Jharkhand Mukti Morcha), GM Harish Balayogi (Telugu Desam Party), Shashank Mani Tripathi, Tejaswi Surya, Bhubaneswar Kalita (all from BJP), Mallikarjun Devda (Shiv Sena), former Indian Ambassador to the US Taranjit Singh Sandhu, and Shiv Sena MP Milind Deora. The delegation arrived in the US after concluding their visit to Brazil, and also held a meeting with the US House Foreign Affairs Committee leadership in Washington, DC, HFAC Chairman Brian Mast, Ranking Member of the committee, Gregory Meeks, South and Central Asia Subcommittee Chair Bill Huizenga, Ranking members – Sydney Kamlager-Dove and Ami Bera, Subcommittee on East Asia and the Pacific Chair, Young Kim. As many as 26 people were killed and several others were injured in a terrorist attack in Baisaran valley of Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on April 22. Among the victims were 25 Indian nationals and one Nepali citizen. In response to the Pahalgam attack, the Indian Armed Forces launched 'Operation Sindoor' on May 7 and targeted terror infrastructures in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, resulting in the killing of more than 100 terrorists. India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire on May 10. ALSO READ | 'India Never Asked Trump To Mediate', Says Tharoor In US Amid Rahul Gandhi's 'Surrender' Remark Row About the Author Vani Mehrotra Vani Mehrotra is the Deputy News Editor at She has nearly 10 years of experience in both national and international news and has previously worked on multiple desks. Get breaking news, in-depth analysis, and expert perspectives on everything from politics to crime and society. Stay informed with the latest India news only on News18. Download the News18 App to stay updated! First Published: June 05, 2025, 09:48 IST


New Indian Express
36 minutes ago
- New Indian Express
DMK MP Kanimozhi calls on TN CM after Sindoor outreach
CHENNAI: DMK MP Kanimozhi called on Chief Minister MK Stalin at his camp office on Wednesday following her visit to five countries under Operation Sindoor outreach. Stalin shared on his X platform a video clip of Kanimozhi responding to a question in Spain about the national language of India. In the clip Kanimozhi is seen saying, 'The national language of India is 'Unity in Diversity'.' Stalin wrote on X, 'I am proud of Kanimozhi who spoke Tamil Nadu's language of unity and love as the voice of India.' Kanimozhi led one of the seven all-party delegations formed by the centre to visit key countries and highlight India's zero-tolerance approach towards terrorism. Earlier, when Kanimozhi arrived in Chennai, she was given a grand welcome at the airport by the party cadre.