New Delhi: Bangladesh war hero Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw has said that India twice lost a chance to resolve the Kashmir issue during Ayub Khan's regime and allowed the problem to grow "big".

Expressing regrets that nobody either in India or Pakistan had been strong enough to solve the issue, Manekshaw claimed that way back an option had come up when Pakistani military ruler Ayub Khan had proposed to late Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru that as both of them were unquestionable leaders in their respective countries, they could move forward a solution of the Kashmir issue.

"Ayub Khan, President of Pakistan, who, though senior to me, was a friend," Manekshaw told reporters at the sidelines of a Kargil war book release.

"I saw Nehru, I told him, I can do what I like in Pakistan and nobody dare say anything and Panditji, you can commit murder in India and everybody will say wah! wah! So, can we sort it out," the former Army Chief quoted the Pakistani strongman as having told him.

"But Panditji said, 'you have no right to be in Kashmir. Kashmir belongs to us,'" Manekshaw said Ayub Khan had told him, adding, "So it could have been done then."

He said the second opportunity to solve Kashmir issue came after the 1971 war, when the then Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto, after promising to co- operate on resolving the issue to late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, got away with only seeking time for it.

"Bhutto told Gandhi, 'I have just taken over from Yahya Khan. If I do anything now, they will throw me out. Give me a chance, I promise you, everything will be OK.' But he had no damned intention of ever doing anything," he said.

When asked to comment on the recent redeployment of troops from the border and whether Indian forces should have attacked Pakistan, Manekshaw said, "These are all political matters and nothing we soldiers can do. It's a political thing."

PTI