Army Chief rubbishes telephone-tapping reports

New Delhi, Mar 5 (ANI): Chief of Army Staff, General V. K. Singh, on Monday rubbished reports that he had deployed interceptors for secretly listening to important phone conversations as 'fiction' and took a dig at the media over the report.

"Fiction doesn't require any reaction. If people concoct stories and some of the irresponsible editors allow those stories to get published, I do not think it requires any reaction," he said.

An anonymous complaint received by the government in recent days lists several allegations against General Singh, which includes possible misuse of off-the-air interceptors to listen in on phone conversations.

According to the complaint, the deployment was part of an effort to listen in conversations between key people, who may have decided the government strategy on the army chief's age row.

Meanwhile, commenting on border difference with China, Minister of State for Defence Dr. M.M. Pallam Raju said both New Delhi and Beijing are committed to resolve the border issue amicably.

"We all know that there are differences of the perceptions of the border and on which India and China are having an extended dialogue, they are at the level of the National Security Advisors. We have had 15 rounds of discussions. We are working on it," said Dr. Raju.

"I think the Prime Minister has said earlier that relationship between India and China has more important things to talk about, like you have a growing trade, we have similar challenges and we are both playing very important roles on the world stage," he added.

The Minister of State for Defence further said the Indian Army is investing billions into strengthening its manufacturing and acquiring improved military technology by increasing participation from the private sector.

"We are living in a very challenging neighbourhood, so there is a need for augmenting our defence preparedness, so we have been spending adequately. The 12th five year plan, the envisage spending is to the tune of $ 100-120 billion and we are improvising the acquisition of capabilities and you know not only are we strengthening the manufacturing facilities we have within the public sector, we are also increasing greater participation by the private sector," he said. (ANI)