How Pak media reacted to India's surgical strikes

The Pakistani media on Thursday mostly toed the official line while reporting on Indian surgical strikes inside Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and stuck to the claim that there were no strikes by India but ‘cross-border firing’, in which two Pakistani soldiers were killed.

Pakistan’s major English newspaper the Dawn, however, came up with a report late in the evening that Pakistani Army has ‘captured one Indian soldier and killed several others (external link) while responding to unprovoked firing by Indian troops across the Line of Control’.

Shortly after it, another English daily the Express Tribune rejected the report (external link), quoting the Inter-Services Public Relations which denied capturing any Indian soldier.

‘…two officials based in Chhamb sector said the Indian soldier with weapons was captured at 1330 local time on Thursday. Separately, security sources confirmed the same to Dawn.com. The sources said a 22-year-old Indian soldier by the name Chandu Babulal Chohan was taken into custody by Pakistani forces,’ the Dawn said in its report.

The Express Tribune, on the other hand, quoted Pak military’s media wing as saying that ‘no Indian soldier was in Pakistan Army’s custody’.

In his show on Geo News (external link), senior Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir said that 14 Indian soldiers were killed in two sectors, a claim confimed by a defence analyst on the panel.

The Pakistani media also quoted the ISPR as saying that ‘Pakistani troops befittingly responded to Indian unprovoked firing on the LoC’; and that nine Pak soldiers were injured in the exchange of fire.

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