Rahul Gandhi, Congress raise heat on Jaishankar, not all in party on board

Not everyone in the Congress, however, is on board with this new line of attack, with the party having previously declared unequivocal support for the government on whatever action it took against the terrorists behind the Pahalgam attack – as a well-considered strategy to not let the BJP take the high ground on nationalism.

“EAM Jaishankar’s silence isn’t just telling – it’s damning. So I’ll ask again: How many Indian aircraft did we lose because Pakistan knew? This wasn’t a lapse. It was a crime. And the nation deserves the truth,” Gandhi said in a social media post, his second in the last three days. After his first post, the Ministry of External Affairs had called Gandhi’s statement “a misrepresentation of facts”.

Stretching the argument further Monday, Khera said Jaishankar’s remarks could have given terrorists the time to flee from their hideouts. “Prime Minister Modi and the Foreign Minister will have to answer why this was done,” he said, adding: “The government should answer how many aircraft did the country lose? What losses did the country suffer? How many terrorists escaped?… What does it mean that you informed them? Do you trust the terrorists so much that they will stay there once you inform them? What is your relationship with them?… Do you call this strategy… I am sorry, but in village language, it is called mukhbiri (acting as an informant). This is spying, a crime and betrayal.”

Khera said: “Was it because of this spying that Azhar Masood and Hafiz Saeed escaped alive? Does the country not deserve to know that you saved Azhar Masood…? This is the same Masood who was saved earlier in Kandahar… Why was there a conspiracy to save him for the second time?… If we have forewarned Pakistan, then obviously terrorists like Azhar Masood and Hafiz Saeed must have escaped.”

A senior Congress leader expressed apprehension that the party may end up hurting itself. “To call Jaishankar an informer is stretching it a bit too far. Every issue has a certain elasticity… you don’t stretch it to the bone. In politics, you try to make a point but don’t stretch it too far which hurts the original point,” the leader said, also questioning “this habit of making a statement every day”.

A CWC member told The Indian Express that it would have been better had the Congress raised specific lapses. “I agree there are some flaws which we can point out. There was an element of intelligence failure in the Pahalgam attack, there was mismanagement in the way the US President (first) announced the ceasefire… even agreeing to a ceasefire immediately. You could have made Pakistan beg for it for a couple of days… The fact that no big country stood with India on the issue of terrorism is another point… because it became a India-Pakistan war-like situation and world capitals were seeing it through the prism of war and not terrorism, which was the original issue… These are issues. But we should make these points in a calibrated manner.”

On the Congress calling Jaishankar a “mukhbir”, the CWC leader said: “I don’t agree… I don’t know whether it is a line decided by the party at the highest level or his (Khera’s) own on-the-spot creation.”

Another leader said Rahul’s argument too was “problematic”. “The country, I think, is not in a position to know about losses suffered by our forces. We are entering a narrow lane, losing sight of the big picture.”

Sources said the issue of whether India suffered losses had come up at a meeting the party’s senior leadership had last week, where Gandhi talked in detail about his assessment regarding the Chinese “involvement” in terms of the aircraft and missiles used by Pakistan. “There was a mention of the possible losses suffered by the Indian Air Force, but the party did not make these points public,” a source said.

“When Jaishankar made that statement, Rahul perhaps saw an opportunity to corner him and the government,” one leader said.

Speaking to reporters last Thursday, Jaishankar had said: “At the start of the operation, we had sent a message to Pakistan saying we are striking at terrorists’ infrastructure. We are not striking at the military. So the military has an option of standing out and not interfering in this process. They chose not to take that good advice.”

Jaishankar was referring to the call made by Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) Lt General Rajiv Ghai to his Pakistani counterpart Major General Kashif Abdullah after the Indian Armed Forces struck nine terror sites in Pakistan and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir between 1 am and 1.30 am on May 7.

Lt Gen Ghai had told his Pakistani counterpart that India had hit “carefully chosen” terror targets and had not struck military targets. A message was relayed to Pakistan that if it wanted to talk, India was willing to engage.

In his first post on X Saturday, Gandhi said: “Informing Pakistan at the start of our attack was a crime. EAM has publicly admitted that GOI did it. Who authorised it? How many aircraft did our air force lose as a result?”.

The Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement then: “The External Affairs Minister had stated that we had warned Pakistan at the start, which is clearly the early phase after Op Sindoor’s commencement. This is being falsely represented as being before the commencement. This utter misrepresentation of facts is being called out.”

The BJP also hit back at Gandhi. “Rahul Gandhi seems to have learned nothing from his past mistakes. He continues to disrespect the Nation’s Armed Forces by questioning how many jets were lost – despite clear statements from the IAF and MEA confirming there were no asset losses. He misquotes the MEA, even though the DGMO clarified in his May 11 briefing that India had made efforts to communicate with its counterparts. Is the Congress party truly serious about supporting the nation? Their actions suggest otherwise,” Union Minister Pralhad Joshi said in a post on X.