‘Incorrect' that India lost Rafale ‘jets' during Operation Sindoor, says defence secretary

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It is incorrect to say that multiple Rafale jets of the Indian Air Force were shot down by Pakistan during Operation Sindoor, Defence Secretary RK Singh told CNBC-TV18 on Monday.
Singh refused to answer a question regarding the losses the Air Force suffered during the initial phase of the four-day conflict, the news channel reported.
'You have used the term Rafales in the plural, I can assure you that is absolutely not correct,' Singh told CNBC-TV18. 'Pakistan suffered losses many times over India in both human and material terms and more than 100 terrorists.'
The defence secretary also reiterated that the government had given the Indian military operational freedom during the conflict. 'No political constraints on our armed forces and they have full operational freedom in conflict,' he said.
This came following a remark by Captain Shiv Kumar, India's defence attaché to Indonesia, on June 10 that the Indian Air Force had lost fighter jets to Pakistan during Operation Sindoor on May 7 because of the ' constraint given by the political leadership'.
'Suppression of enemy air defences and destruction of enemy air defences is very very important…' Kumar said. 'I may not agree…that India lost so many aircraft, but I do agree we did lose some aircraft.'
He added: 'And that happened only because of the constraint given by the political leadership to not attack the military establishment or [Pakistani] air defences'.
Kumar had said that the tactics were changed after the loss and 'we went for their military installations'.
The defence attaché had made the comments during a seminar analysing the India-Pakistan conflict at a university in Jakarta. He made the statement in response to Pakistan's claim of having downed six aircraft, including three Rafales. The claims made by Islamabad have not been independently verified.
On Sunday, the Associated Press quoted French Air Force chief General Jérôme Bellanger as saying that he had seen evidence pointing to the Indian Air Force having lost just three fighter jets: a Rafale, a Su-30MKI and a Mirage 2000.
A controversy had erupted after the video of Kumar's remarks surfaced online on June 28.
Following this, the Indian embassy in Jakarta had said that the Navy officer had only pointed out that India's armed forces serve under ' civilian political leadership ', unlike some neighbouring countries.
'It was also explained that the objective of Operation Sindoor was to target terrorist infrastructure and the Indian response was non-escalatory,' it added.
The Indian embassy also said that Kumar's remarks were 'quoted out of context' and 'the media reports are a misrepresentation of the intention and thrust of the presentation made by the speaker'.
Kumar's statement had come more than a month after Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan's May 31 comments that were seen by some as an acknowledgement of the Indian Air Force having lost aircraft during the operation.
Chauhan had told Bloomberg that what was important was 'not the jet being down, but why they were being down'.
'Why they were down, what mistakes were made – that are important,' Chauhan told Bloomberg. ' Numbers are not important.'
He had also said that Pakistan's claims of having shot down six Indian Air Force fighter jets was 'absolutely incorrect'.
Tensions between New Delhi and Islamabad escalated on May 7 when the Indian military carried out strikes – codenamed Operation Sindoor – on what it claimed were terrorist camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
The strikes were in response to the terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam, which killed 26 persons on April 22.
The Pakistan Army retaliated to Indian strikes by repeatedly shelling Indian villages along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir. At least 22 Indian civilians and eight defence personnel were killed in the shelling.
India and Pakistan on May 10 reached an 'understanding' to halt firing following the four-day conflict.