“All I can say is that we have enormous respect for the American presidency and the American president. All we can say for ourselves is that we have never particularly wanted to ask anyone to mediate,” said Tharoor, the leader of the all-party parliamentary delegation which arrived here on Tuesday afternoon and began its packed day of meetings with lawmakers and government officials on Wednesday.
During an interaction at the National Press Club here on Wednesday, Tharoor stressed that India had no real difficulty in speaking the same language as the Pakistanis.
“As long as they use the language of terrorism, we will use the language of force. That doesn’t require a third party,” he said.
The delegation comprising MPs Sarfaraz Ahmad, Ganti Harish Madhur Balayogi, Shashank Mani Tripathi, Bhubaneswar Kalita, Milind Deora, Tejasvi Surya, and India’s former ambassador to the US Taranjit Sandhu, arrived from India in New York on May 24, and travelled to Guyana, Panama, Colombia and Brazil before arriving in Washington, the last leg of the tour to convey India’s stance following the Pahalgam terror attack and Operation Sindoor.
Tharoor said if Pakistan were to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism, “we can talk to them”.
“If they take serious actions to show they want to restore normal relationships with us, we can certainly talk to them again without needing an intermediary.”
“So it’s not in any way a negative comment about the goodwill of people. During this conflict, as I said, in any case, India didn’t need persuading to stop. No one needed to tell us to ‘stop’, because we were telling them the moment Pakistan stops, we’re prepared to stop.”
“So if they, in turn, told the Pakistanis, ‘you better stop, because Indians are willing to stop’, and that was what they did, then that’s a wonderful gesture on their part vis-à-vis Pakistan,” Tharoor said.
He added that “all we can say is that in our conversations, some of these things didn’t come up”.
Noting that he was saying this in a “constructive spirit”, Tharoor said: “We have an enormous respect for the US, and we have a much more important, valuable strategic partnership with Washington that we wouldn’t want to jeopardise over a matter of detail. We are interested, talking at the moment about a number of areas of cooperation, interested in enhancing all of that. So small matters can go by, and we can focus on tomorrow.”
Tharoor was responding to a question about India’s response to the constant claim by Trump that he mediated in the conflict between India and Pakistan.
He was also asked if this is a question the Congress party continues to ask back in India, and party leader Rahul Gandhi commented that Prime Minister Narendra Modi “surrendered” after receiving a phone call from Trump.
Delegation member Deora said: “As far as the political question is concerned, I would like to express my admiration for Tharoor. I’ve known him for a long time. He always puts country before party.”
Surya, responding to Deora’s comment, said: “Absolutely.”
In response to a question on what role the US had in encouraging talks between India and Pakistan, Tharoor said: “I think the US has understood for some time now that India has a very clear position that there will be no talks with a gun pointed at our head. It’s not that we can’t talk to Pakistan.”
“India can speak all the languages that Pakistanis speak. The problem is that we will not dialogue with people who are pointing a gun at our head. You’re not going to talk to people who are pointing a gun at your temples. It’s not going to happen,” Tharoor said.
Addressing reporters at a press conference at the Indian Embassy, Tharoor said that every time anybody asked, “and that includes on the Hill”, if India would talk to Pakistan or if mediation would help promote dialogue, “our answer is very clear. We cannot talk to people who are pointing a gun at our head.”
“If your neighbour attacks your children with their attack dogs and then says, ‘let’s talk’, will you talk to them until they put away the attack dogs?”
Tensions between India and Pakistan escalated after the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack, with India carrying out precision strikes on terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in the early hours of May 7.
The on-ground hostilities ended with an understanding of stopping the military actions following talks between the directors general of military operations of both sides on May 10.
