Two days after BJP president Amit Shah claimed that “more than 250” terrorists were killed in the IAF strike at Balakot, Minister of State for External Affairs General VK Singh on Tuesday said, “the count was an estimate based on people who were housed in the buildings that were hit”.

Defending the Bharatiya Janata Party chief, Singh said Amit Shah was not saying that it was a confirmed figure, but that this many might have died.

He further said the “250 casualty” figure was of the attack on Balakot and that the attack was carried out only at one place and nowhere else.

“The target was selected carefully, away from residential areas to avoid civilian casualty,” he added.

Becoming the first leader of the ruling government to put out the number of casualties in the IAF strike on a terror camp in Pakistan’s Balakot, BJP president Amit Shah on Sunday claimed that “more than 250” terrorists were killed in the operation, even when the government is yet to give out an official count of the terrorists killed.

“After Uri, our forces went into Pakistan and carried out surgical strikes. They avenged the death of our soldiers. After Pulwama, everyone thought there could be no surgical strikes, what will happen? But under (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi’s leadership, the government carried out an air strike after the 13th day and killed more than 250 terrorists,” Amit Shah said at a public rally in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad.

Read | ‘Over 250 terrorists’ killed in IAF strike, claims Amit Shah; but no official count

Following the Pulwama terror attack, India carried out “non-military pre-emptive” airstrikes targeting the JeM training camp in Balakot in Pakistan’s restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, about 80-km from the Line of Control (LoC) early on February 26.

There were reports that over 300 terrorists were killed in the assault and that the IAF jets had struck terror camps and launch pads across the LoC in Balakot, Muzaffarabad and Chakoti.

The opposition has however raised questions on the number of casualties put out by government sources.

Further targeting Congress leader Digvijaya Singh who termed the Pulwama attack as an “accident”, Singh asked if “Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination was an accident or a terror incident”.

Earlier, Digvijaya Singh had also asked the Narendra Modi-led Central government to make public proof of the strikes targetting terrorist camps, just like the US had done after their navy seals killed Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan.