Global outreach teams to justify Indus treaty stand post-Operation Sindoor

Time of India

20-05-2025

NEW DELHI: The all-party delegations headed to different parts of the world as part of the outreach post-Operation Sindoor will apprise foreign capitals of the 'new normal' in India's approach to Pakistan's use of terrorism, including the decision to pause the
Indus Waters Treaty
.
In a briefing to members of three delegations, foreign secretary Vikram Misri is learned to have said that Pakistan's nuclear blackmail would no longer allow terrorists to work with impunity and that the military establishment would pay a heavy price for any attempt to carry out attacks in India through its terror proxies. "
Operation Sindoor
is our new normal," a source quoted Misri as saying, showing that the anti-terror doctrine spelt out by PM Modi at Adampur on May 13 has been baked into
foreign policy
.
Misri is also learned to have said India could not adhere to the existing terms of IWT. "The treaty was negotiated on the assumption of good neighbourliness... It has been belied by Pakistan's use of terrorism because of which we have not been able to realise even the share, inadequate as it was, allocated to us," one of the members of the delegation led by JD(U)'s Sanjay Jha told TOI.
NC MP skips MEA briefing, no confirmation yet if he'd join tour
Moreover, the challenge of climate change makes a relook at the technical design of dams and other projects an absolute necessity, one of the members of the delegation led by JDU's Sanjay Jha told TOI.
The doctrine spelt out by PM Modi on May 13 in Adampur signalled India's lower tolerance threshold towards terror as well as its refusal to give in to Pakistan's nuke blackmail.
Given the risk of appearing to be insensitive towards a lower riparian state, the boldness on IWT, as articulated by Misri, points to govt's determination to force a re-negotiation of the treaty.
Members of the delegations headed by Jha, Shiv Sena's Shrikant Shinde & DMK's Kanimozhi attended the briefings.
However, Kanimozhi herself could not attend. NC MP Altaf Ahmed, who is on Kanimozhi's panel, skipped the meet and there was no confirmation till late evening on whether he would be going on the tour.
While Tuesday's briefing was intended for the groups departing on May 21, 22 and 23, Misri will brief the remaining delegations on Friday, sharing with them the talking points that can be stressed to familiarise their interlocutors with what India sees as Pakistan's double-dealing on the issue of
cross-border terrorism
.
While there has been some talk about India-Pakistan re-hyphenation, govt believes the vast gap in economic fundamentals between the two nations will ultimately prevail, leaving Pakistan far behind in the global imagination.
While underscoring the need for the international community to call out Pakistan for its cross-border adventurism over past 40 years, Misri briefed the delegations about how the world asks the two countries to exercise restraint when there's a flare-up of tensions but does not seek accountability from Pakistan even when its role is obvious to all in perpetrating the most heinous acts of terrorism.
He cited example of how there had not been enough pressure on Islamabad to bring the guilty to justice in cases like Mumbai and Pathankot attacks. An MP quoted Misri as saying that trusting Pakistan was like "trusting a chor (thief) to investigate the crime he had committed".
Misri also briefed the delegations about India's decision to put IWT in abeyance till the time Pakistan acted irrevocably against cross-border terrorism.
Unfazed by Pakistan's propaganda and its claim that it was an "act of war", the delegates are set to take a firm position in defence of govt suspending the treaty.
The foreign secretary reiterated India's stand on the issue and urged the delegates to convey to the world that the unrelenting cross-border terrorism from Pakistan interfered with "our ability" to exploit the treaty as per its provisions. "It is only natural and well within India's right to hold the treaty in abeyance when the fundamental ground situations have changed," Misri is said to have told the delegates.