Army Chief denies leaking letter to PM, calls it treason

Army Chief General VK Singh has said he was outraged by the leak of an official letter he had written to the Prime Minister in which he had spoken of the delay in procurement of equipment, and demanded that the source of the leak be found and dealt with immediately. In  a statement issued on Thursday the Army chief said that the leaking of the letter to the media amounted to high treason and was an attempt to tarnish his reputation. [caption id=“attachment_259319” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“The Army chief said an attempt was being made to tarnish his reputation.Screen grab from CNN-IBN”]  [/caption] “This is an outrage. I have nothing to do with the leak of the letter to the PM,” he said in the statement. Official communication with the Prime Minister or Defence Minister was priveleged information and the leakage of the letter should be treated as high treason, Singh added. “The source of the leak should be found and dealt with ruthlessly. The cynical approach to tar my reputation should stop,” he said. The General’s letter to the Prime Minister, written on 12 March 2012, had highlighted the shortcomings in the defence equipment procurement procedure for the army and had stated that some divisions of the army were struggling with equipment shortages. The Defence Minister meanwhile told Parliament on Wednesday that the government was making all efforts to ensure that the armed forces had all the equipment they needed. However, political parties supporting the ruling UPA alliance like the RJD and Samajwadi Party had called for the removal of Singh from his post.