Media report on troop movement unfortunate but true: Tewari

Insisting discussion at the panel-level should not be brought in public domain, Naqvi said the army has "already clarified" the matter and the same was over three years ago itself.

"I don't know from where he got this dream. The army had already clarified about it and the matter was over at that time itself," he said.

CPI(M) politburo member Brinda Karat said the matter has to be looked into "if there is any truth in it." She also questioned if there was any truth in the troop movement claim, why it was denied by the UPA Government then? 

"Now I don't know why after three years Mr Manish Tewari is making this comment. But if there is any truth at all in it, obviously, it is a very serious matter which has to be looked into enquired into.

"The question remains, that the then government had at that time totally denied it. So, if there was a truth in it, why it was denied then? So, they are also answerable to the country," Karat said.

"A family knows if there was something wrong in a family, within a member of the family or with the family but everybody tries to hide it so that the neighbours don't get to know so there is an embarrassment. In the process, the flaw remains hidden.

"I think it was one of those things and frankly UPA was then in a very weak state of mind and this was seen by them as something much too embarrassing or something probably which they thought if they admitted to have happened they would have had to respond to or take action on," Gupta said.

Information and Broadcasting Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said army had already denied in 2012 that any such thing had happened. He also deprecated Tewari's action of speaking about what transpired in a Parliamentary committee meeting.

"I have been the I&B Minister before and after him (Tewari). There is an unwritten rule of Parliamentary etiquette. You don't disclose what is talked about inside a parliamentary committee," he said.

BJP leader Satpal Maharaj, who then headed the Standing Committee on Defence said,"I was the chairman of the committee then and came to know about this matter at that time.

"We were told that such army movements keep happening. You know that army keeps shifting from one place to other," he said.

Union Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, who was also on the panel, however, said he "doesn't remember" if the matter was discussed.

Maintaining that discussions of Parliamentary committees should not be brought into the public domain, Naqvi said the army had "already clarified" the matter.

"I don't know from where he (Tewari) got this dream. The army had already clarified about it and the matter was over at that time itself," he said.

CPI(M) politburo member Brinda Karat said,"The question remains that the then government had at that time totally denied it. So, if there was a truth in it, why it was denied then? So, they are also answerable to the country."