Arvind Kejriwal accuses Amit Shah of calling armed forces 'liar' after BJP chief claims 250 deaths in IAF strikes

New Delhi: Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal Monday said Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) president Amit Shah took a stand contradictory to that of the armed forces over the number of terrorists killed in the pre-dawn air strikes on terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed’s (JeM) training camps in Pakistan. On Sunday, Shah said the air strikes killed more than 250 terrorists, while the armed forces still haven’t put out any official figure. “The armed forces are also saying this. Amit Shah is saying that the armed forces are lying, 250 (terrorists) were killed. Amit Shah is calling the armed forces a liar. The country will not tolerate this under any circumstances,” Kejriwal tweeted, referring to a news report which quotes Union minister SS Ahluwalia as saying that the purpose of the strike was to send a message and not to kill. [caption id=“attachment_5192011” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal. PTI[/caption] In another tweet, the Delhi chief minister said the whole country stands with the armed forces while the BJP stands against them. “The armed forces cannot lie, but the BJP is lying. The whole country stands with the armed forces, but BJP stands against them,” Kejriwal said. At an event in Ahmedabad, Shah had said: “After Pulwama attack, everyone was thinking that we can’t do surgical strike so what will happen…But Narendra Modi government, on the 13th day (after the attack), conducted air strikes and killed more than 250 terrorists.” At a press conference on Monday, IAF chief BS Dhanoa declined to comment on the toll in the Balakot strike, saying it was for the government to provide details on the number of terrorists killed. “We don’t count human casualties. We count what targets we have hit or not hit,” he said. The bomb damage assessment that is done post a mission only calculates the target that has been hit or not hit, the air chief noted. “We can’t count how many people have died. That depends on how many people were there,” Dhanoa said, adding that a statement on the number of terrorists killed will be made by the government.