6 min readMay 25, 2025 10:03 AM IST
First published on: May 25, 2025 at 07:15 AM IST
Our political leaders shamed India last week. At the end of an ugly war that we fought and won, they could have shown grace and maturity befitting a democratic country. Instead, they made speeches and statements more befitting politicians in a tawdry autocracy. It was not just our political leaders who let the side down, but the media as well. Nearly all our private news channels turned their studios into war rooms. And celebrated TV anchors passed jingoism off as journalism.
Instead of investigating where the killers of Pahalgam have vanished, they wasted time expressing ill-informed opinions on national security. Some even became instant economists and questioned why the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had disbursed the next tranche of its loan to Pakistan. There was so much noise about ‘timing’ that the IMF had to remind us that these decisions are taken by the board. I have been in journalism for more than 50 years and have often been proud of how the Indian media has graduated seamlessly from press release journalism to holding the powerful to account and becoming a pillar of democracy. But last week, as I switched from one news channel to the next, I felt ashamed and embarrassed.
What was worse was that when I listened to the speeches and statements of the most important political leaders in India, I felt as ashamed and embarrassed. Let us begin with the Leader of the Opposition and the tone he set for his spokespersons. Rahul Gandhi has every right to question what happened in Operation Sindoor. He should ask why we have not yet traced the killers of Pahalgam. He should ask why it seems always that the identification of terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir happens after some horrific incident. Why never before an incident. He should ask why the Home Minister misled us into believing that terrorism had been crushed in Kashmir. He should ask why tourists had been encouraged to picnic in that unsecured meadow above Pahalgam. And there must be a hundred other questions to ask.
He chose, instead, to charge the Minister of External Affairs with leaking war plans to Pakistan and then went on to make the irresponsible charge that India agreed to a ceasefire under American pressure. His spokespersons followed their leader and went further. They appeared on TV debates to declare that India could have reoccupied PoK and destroyed Pakistan completely if Narendra Modi had not buckled under pressure from Donald Trump. Is Rahul Gandhi aware that the stand he has taken has been praised by Hafiz Saeed himself and publicly? The Congress party’s charges were ludicrous and should have been treated by our Prime Minister with the contempt they deserve. He chose instead to take the bait and make a speech that belonged more in a Bollywood film than on a serious political platform.
The dignified statesman who once told Vladimir Putin that ‘this is not an era for war’ disappeared and was replaced by a rabble rouser who ranted that it was no longer blood that coursed in his veins but ‘hot sindoor’. Instead of calmly stating India’s case and the reasons why we would be obliged to respond if there was more terrorism from Pakistan on our soil, he chose bluster and bombast. He declared that this was the new India, and this was a new kind of justice. Taking their cue from their ‘beloved Leader’, BJP spokespersons have not hesitated to charge the Congress party with speaking ‘the language of Pakistan’. Where does it get us when things like this get said in the highest echelons of Indian politics? The answer is that it brings India down to the level of the Islamist republic next door. It does nothing to solve the menace of jihadist terrorism we still face almost daily.
As I write these words, there are encounters with terrorists under way in Jammu & Kashmir, and there is no sign that this will change any time soon. So, are we going to have Operation Sindoor 2.0 soon? Or are we going to ask the men responsible for national security to explain why we always seem to be a step behind the jihadis? Why does this continue to happen?
As the daughter of a soldier, I spent most of my childhood in Army stations across India and developed a deep admiration for the Indian Army. It was in Army messes in obscure towns with names like Babina and Mhow that I met some of the finest men I have ever met. They were men who cherished honour and courage above all. Men who dismissed lightly the possibility of needing to die defending our borders. They considered it their job to give their lives for India.
There are still men like this in the armed forces and when politicians disrespect their service and turn it into a political soap opera, they dishonour their sacrifices. What we have seen in these past days since the end of the military engagement is a political soap opera of the tawdriest kind. We must hope that it stops soon and that our political leaders start behaving in a more dignified fashion. As for the media, it is time for TV anchors and reporters to remember that they harm India by constantly passing off jingoism as journalism. The job of journalists is to report what is happening. Not to beat war drums.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Adampur Air Force base; Rahul Gandhi during his visit to Poonch. (Photos: PTI) 
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