This is the first time the PM has mentioned the Wing Commander in Pakistan custody directly by name. He did make a quip yesterday, at a science award function where he said, "You are folks who spend your lives in a laboratory, and are used to conducting pilot projects. A pilot project is followed by scalability. Now a pilot project has been completed. Now we have to make it real. Earlier it was just a practice session".

The 'pilot project' remark did not go down well with several people pointing out it was tasteless.