Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, currently leading the all-party Operation Sindoor delegation abroad, firmly dismissed any notion of third-party mediation in the ceasefire understanding between India and Pakistan. Speaking from Brazil ahead of the delegation's upcoming visit to the United States, Tharoor emphasized that India had no need for external persuasion to halt hostilities, as the country had never sought war in the first place.
“We have enormous respect for the American presidency,” Tharoor said, acknowledging former U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim of brokering the ceasefire. “But no one needed to persuade us to stop. We had already said to stop.” He underscored that if any pressure had been exerted by the U.S., it would have been directed at Pakistan, not India. “They would have had to be persuaded. We don't need to be persuaded because we don't want war. We want to focus on development. That's the basic message,” he added.
Tharoor clarified that India's military actions were reactive and targeted solely at terrorism, not intended as an opening to broader conflict. “We had consistently said from the very beginning on May 7th that we are not interested in prolonging the conflict,” he said. “If Pakistan had not reacted, we would not have reacted. All it is, is retribution against the terrorists — period.”
These comments were in direct response to Donald Trump’s repeated assertions that he brokered a ceasefire following four days of heightened military engagement between the two nations, including missile and drone strikes. Trump was the first to publicly announce the ceasefire, a statement later echoed by Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri at a press briefing. However, India officially maintains that the ceasefire understanding was achieved bilaterally after Pakistan’s Director General of Military Operations (DGMO) reached out to his Indian counterpart on May 10, following Pakistan’s escalation in response to India’s Operation Sindoor.
Operation Sindoor, which targeted terrorist infrastructure across the border, prompted the Indian government to deploy seven cross-party delegations globally to brief foreign governments on the operation and Pakistan’s role in supporting terrorism. Tharoor’s team is part of this diplomatic effort. In a parallel move, Pakistan has dispatched its own delegation led by Bilawal Bhutto to counter India’s narrative abroad.
Highlighting the diplomatic dynamic, Tharoor noted that both delegations would be in Washington, DC, simultaneously. “In Washington, we’ll have the interesting phenomenon of the Pakistani delegation in America, and almost exactly the same days... So there’s going to be perhaps an increase in interest because there are two duelling delegations in the same city,” he remarked, hinting at a charged diplomatic atmosphere in the U.S. capital.
Tharoor’s statements not only reaffirm India’s stance on the ceasefire but also reflect the government’s strategic emphasis on development and international transparency, while countering what it sees as misinformation from both domestic and international quarters.
