Lt Gen (Retd) DS Hooda, the officer who was the Northern Army commander during the 2016 surgical strikes on terror launch pads in PoK, will head a Congress task force on national security.

The Congress said party president Rahul Gandhi met Hooda and discussed modalities for the panel that will comprise a select group of experts.

“Congress President @RahulGandhi met with Lt Gen DS Hooda (retd) to institute a task force on National Security which will prepare a vision paper for the country. Gen Hooda will lead the task force & work with a select group of experts,” the party tweeted.

Congress President @RahulGandhi met with Lt Gen DS Hooda (retd) to institute a task force on National Security which will prepare a vision paper for the country. Gen Hooda will lead the task force & work with a select group of experts. pic.twitter.com/06zfIjfbeJ

— Congress (@INCIndia) February 21, 2019

Congress spokesperson Priyanka Chaturvedi tweeted: “Yet another positive and welcome step towards a strong nation and stronger national security by Congress President @RahulGandhi. The experience that Lt Gen (Retd) D S Hooda brings in, will benefit the nation in the long run.”

In another tweet, she said, “The only thing they will find is Surgical Strike and How’s the josh?! :))”

On September 29, 2016, the Army had carried out surgical strikes on seven terrorist launch pads across the Line of Control (LoC) in retaliation to an attack on its base in Uri earlier that month.

The Congress has been accusing the Modi government of politicising the surgical strikes. DS Hooda too had earlier said the strikes had been “unnecessarily hyped” by the Centre to garner political mileage.

READ | It would have been better if surgical strikes were carried out secretly: Lt Gen DS Hooda

At the Military Literature Festival (MLF) 2018 held in Chandigarh in December 2018, Hooda had said constant maintenance of hype around the military operation was unwarranted, and that it endangered India’s future defence cross border responses to inflict enemy damage.

Responding to news about the Congress task force, the retired officer clarified on Thursday he had not joined the party, and that his involvement would be restricted to the task force.

“I would be picking up my own team which may consist of 5-6 persons. These persons would be drawn from different backgrounds such as military, foreign policy experts and may be also from the police,” Hooda told IANS.

He said the task force would target to submit a report in about a month’s time on various aspects of the national security.