By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Defence Minister Khawaja Asif on Saturday dismissed as “implausible” and “comical” claims by the Indian Air Force chief that India shot down five Pakistani fighter jets and one military aircraft during a confrontation in May, marking the first official Indian statement on the incident three months after the worst hostilities between the nuclear-armed neighbours in decades.
The claims, made by Indian Air Chief Marshal Amar Preet Singh at an event in Bengaluru, come amid heightened tensions following the May 7-10 clashes, which were sparked by New Delhi’s unsubstantiated allegations of Pakistani involvement in a deadly attack in occupied Kashmir
India targeted what it called “terrorist infrastructure” inside Pakistan, calling it Operation Sindoor and saying it was in response to a gun attack in Pahalgam. Islamabad denied any involvement and called for an impartial international probe into the incident.
Pakistan said during the intense, four-day standoff it had shot down six Indian fighter jets, including French-made Rafales, right at the outset of the war. It also gave a technical briefing to the foreign media on how the situation unfolded at the outset of the conflict. Indian politicians and military officials have also acknowledged that their forces suffered losses in the air, but denied losing six aircraft.
France’s air chief, General Jerome Bellanger, has previously said that he has seen evidence of the loss of three Indian fighters, including a Rafale. The Indian Air Force has not commented on those claims. Days after the air combat, The Washington Post, based on visual evidence analysed by experts, reported that at least two French-made Indian fighter aircraft were shot down by the Pakistan Air Force.
After the May 7 combat and tit-for-tat strikes on each other’s airbases, it took American intervention on May 10 for both sides to finally reach a ceasefire.
Indian air chief Singh claimed that India’s Russian-made S-400 surface-to-air missile system downed “at least five fighters confirmed killed, and one large aircraft,” possibly a surveillance plane, at a distance of 300 kilometres, citing electronic tracking data as confirmation of the strikes.
Singh did not mention the type of fighter jets that were downed, but claimed that airstrikes also hit an additional surveillance plane and “a few F16” fighters that were parked in hangars at two air bases in Sindh and Punjab. “This is actually the largest ever recorded surface-to-air kill.”
“The belated assertions made by the Indian Air Force chief regarding alleged destruction of Pakistani aircraft during Operation Sindoor are as implausible as they are ill-timed,” Asif Responded in a post on X.
“It is also ironic how senior Indian military officers are being used as the faces of monumental failure caused by strategic shortsightedness of Indian politicians. For three months, no such claims were voiced, while Pakistan, in the immediate aftermath, presented detailed technical briefings to the international media, and independent observers recorded widespread acknowledgment of the loss of multiple Indian aircraft, including Rafales, by sources ranging from world leaders, senior Indian politicians to foreign intelligence assessments.”
The minister said “not a single Pakistani aircraft was hit or destroyed” by India, adding that Pakistan took out six Indian jets, S400 air defence batteries and unmanned aircraft of India while “swiftly putting several Indian airbases out of action”.
He added that the losses on the Line of Control for Indian armed forces were “disproportionately heavier” as well. “If the truth is in question, let both sides open their aircraft inventories to independent verification — though we suspect this would lay bare the reality India seeks to obscure. Wars are not won by falsehoods but by moral authority, national resolve and professional competence.”
“Such comical narratives, crafted for domestic political expediency, increase the grave risks of strategic miscalculation in a nuclearised environment,” Asif warned.
The defence minister iterated that every violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and territorial integrity would invite “swift, surefire and proportionate response, and responsibility for any ensuing escalation will rest entirely with strategically blind leaders who gamble with South Asia’s peace for fleeting political gains”.
American South Asia expert Michael Kugelman opined that “regardless of whether true or not, the timing of these claims, with US-India ties in crisis, is easy to understand.” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has faced scathing criticism from opposition parties for its lack of “political will to fight” during the May clashes and “failures” to prevent the Pahalgam attack.
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