Several army veterans and others have written to the President, in her capacity as supreme commander of the defence forces, to prevent further controversial remarks like those made by two Madhya Pradesh BJP ministers last week.

The signatories include Admiral Vishnu Bhagwat, star-ranking ex-servicemen, civilians and electoral reforms activist Jagdeep Chhokar.

They said in a statement: “We feel distressed and anguished at the derogatory statements made by deputy chief minister Jagdish Devda and minister Vijay Shah against the defence forces, in the context of the recent India-Pakistan conflict following the horrific Pahalgam terrorist attack on innocent tourists.

“First, Madhya Pradesh minister Vijay Shah made a public statement referring to Colonel Sofiya Qureshi, the official spokesperson for the defence forces, as the ‘(terrorists) wiped the sindoor of our sisters and daughters (in the context of the recent Pahalgam attack by terrorists), and we sent their own sister to give it back to them in kind’,” it said.

They also referred to a statement by Devda that he claimed was being misinterpreted. The remarks in Hindi could be interpreted as the country bowing at the feet of the army for Operation Sindoor, or the country and the army bowing before the Prime Minister. Devda claimed that he meant the latter.

“It may be recalled that earlier, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Shri Yogi Adityanath, made a similar derogatory statement against the defence forces by calling it ‘Modiji ki sena’, in April 2019,” the statement added.

The signatories said: “We feel that the derogatory statements made by the two ministers can adversely affect the morale of the serving personnel of our defence forces, resulting in weakening of national security and territorial integrity.

“Because of the stringent laws and rules governing discipline in the defence forces, its serving personnel are debarred from responding to these derogatory, humiliating statements.

“We therefore respectfully request you to issue directions for appropriate action to be taken by the government to prevent recurrence of such regrettable incidents in the interest of national unity and security,” the statement said.