When the Congress has been taking aim at PM Narendra Modi for alleged “surrender” after President Donald Trump's claims of brokering the India-Pakistan ceasefire during Operation Sindoor, the leading opposition party's senior leader Manish Tewari on Sunday sought to take a more “nuanced” approach.
There's been “backchanneling” in every conflict between the two countries, said Manish Tewari, Lok Sabha member from Chandigarh and a former union minister. He listed several instances, both from Congress and BJP times in the government, of US being involved in such efforts.
Asked by ANI if the Operation Sindoor instance was indeed a case of India's “surrender” before the US, Tewari said: “See, ultimately, backchanneling, mediation and arbitration are three different concepts altogether. And this position has been clarified, that, yes, there was backchanneling.”
He underlined that foreign minister S Jaishankar and PM Modi were speaking to US Vice President JD Vance "and a lot of other people” at the time. He backed the Modi government's assertion, though, that “eventually, the call which led to the cessation of hostilities on May 10, at 5 pm, (after Operation Sindoor) was made that afternoon by the DGMO (Director General of Military Operations) of Pakistan”.
'In Trump's lexicon…': Manish Tewari on ceasefire and US role
He said whether backchanneling had a role to play, “only the stakeholders involved in the process can enunciate”.
{{/usCountry}}He said whether backchanneling had a role to play, “only the stakeholders involved in the process can enunciate”.
{{/usCountry}}Trump has claimed, over 30 times, that he brokered peace using trade as leverage. There are reports that Trump's hostile attitude towards India, and the high trade tariffs thereof, may be his scorned response to not being given credit, thereby affecting his Nobel Peace Prize bid.
“The answer is nuanced,” Tewari said at the start when asked about the ceasefire and Trump's claim.
“In President Trump's lexicon, what earlier used to be backchanneling and quiet, is now frontchanneling! You are confronted with the US administration, which believes in disregarding all established canons and practices of diplomacy and statecraft,” he later added.
A former minister in Manmohan Singh's UPA government, Manish Tewari was one of the Congress leaders picked by the Modi government for multi-party delegations for a global diplomatic outreach about the Pahalgam terror attack and the retaliatory Operation Sindoor. Shashi Tharoor was another, who has been taking stances apparently different from the party's on diplomatic issues in particular.
On Sunday, speaking to the news agency, he listed a series of “backchanneling” efforts involving the US.
Many past instances, cites Tewari
“Going back to Operation Brasstacks (Indian forces' major war exercise) in 1987, when Pakistan first started using the n-word (referring to nuclear weapons), there has been backchanneling in every India-Pakistan crisis,” he said.
He referred to a visit in 1990 by Robert M Gates, the then US President George HW Bush’s adviser, to Delhi and Islamabad during a tensions between India and Pakistan over Kashmir.
“It happened during Operation Parakram (Indian military mobilisation after the 2001 Parliament attack). It happened during 26/11 (terror attack on Mumbai),” he added.
He also listed the Uri (2016) and Pulwama (2019) attacks, after which India took military action, and recalled Trump's claim in 2019 “when he said, ‘there would be good news from India and Pakistan’".
The Congress and the wider Opposition have been “challenging” PM Modi to “say that Trump is a liar”, as India has a sovereign position of not allowing third-party intervention into its relations with Pakistan or other countries.
Accusing Modi of not being tough enough with the US, Rahul Gandhi and other leaders have pointed towards how Indira Gandhi in the 1971 war with Pakistan, which led to the creation of Bangladesh, faced off against American pressure.