Srinagar, India - India's army has said it will no longer build or renovate Muslim shrines or mosques in Indian-administered Kashmir.
The announcement came after clerics accused troops of interfering in the religious affairs of Muslims.
Army corps commander Lt Gen AS Sekhon told reporters the intention had never been to interfere in religious matters or hurt any community's feelings.
Troops have been fighting militants in Jammu and Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state, for 18 years.
India accuses Pakistan of sponsoring the uprising - a charge Islamabad denies.
'Hearts and minds'
Gen Sekhon was speaking near the summer capital, Srinagar, a week after a Muslim cleric in Indian-administered Kashmir issued an edict, or fatwa, saying only Muslims may carry out renovation work on holy sites.
"It has never been our intention to interfere in the religious matters of any community," he told reporters.
"We would not undertake anything that hurts the sentiments of any community."
He said whatever renovation of shrines and mosques had been carried out had been done at the request of local people.
India's army says it has spent more than $130,000 on the repair of Muslim holy sites in the region.
The BBC's Altaf Hussain in Srinagar says the move is part of a campaign to win "hearts and minds".
Under Operation Sadbhavna or Goodwill, they have also built schools and other facilities in the state's rural areas.
A prominent human rights campaigner criticised the operation.
"There is no point in building an odd school here and there when the troops have forcibly occupied a number of schools, hospitals and orchards across the valley," said Pervez Imroz, chairman of the Coalition of Civil Society (CCS).