India strongly condemns Pakistan’s airstrikes on Afghanistan.
India sees Pakistan’s strikes as a sad cover for its own troubles, standing firmly with Afghanistan’s people and land.
The news came on a quiet Sunday, piercing the stillness of the holy month of Ramadan with a familiar, painful thud. India had condemned Pakistan’s airstrikes on Afghan soil, strikes that had torn through the lives of ordinary people—families, children, women observing their fasts—leaving behind not just rubble, but a deeper scar on a land already weary of war.
From the spokesperson’s words in New Delhi, one could sense a restrained outrage, a sorrow laced with stern judgment. He spoke of civilian casualties during “the holy month of Ramadan,” a phrase that was not merely a chronological marker but a poignant reminder of the sacredness of the time, a period meant for prayer, reflection, and peace, now shattered by the sound of explosions. The mention of “women and children” was particularly haunting, for it is always the most vulnerable who pay the heaviest price in conflicts they did not create.
India’s response was measured but clear: this was “another attempt by Pakistan to externalise its internal failures.” Behind that diplomatic phrasing lies a deeply human story. It speaks of a nation grappling with its own demons—economic struggles, political instability, a persistent challenge from militancy within its own borders—and, instead of looking inward, choosing to look across the frontier for an enemy. It is an age-old, tragic pattern: when the mirror shows uncomfortable truths, it is easier to point fingers outward, to blame the neighbor for one’s own afflictions. The strikes, from this perspective, were not just about security; they were a projection, a deflection, a way to unite a fractured domestic audience against a common external foe.
For Afghanistan, the land that has become the stage for this recurring drama, the cost is immeasurable. India’s reiteration of support for Afghanistan’s “sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence” was more than a diplomatic formality. It was a recognition of Afghanistan’s right to determine its own destiny, to live free from the spillover of its neighbors’ conflicts. It was a message of solidarity to the Afghan people, who have endured decades of turmoil, and who, yet again, found themselves caught in the crossfire.
On the other side, Pakistan’s narrative spoke of retaliation, of targeting “terrorist hideouts” in response to attacks on its own soil. The language was one of national security, of a state forced to act to protect its citizens. The claim of neutralizing “70 terrorists” was presented as a necessary, decisive action. For the families in Islamabad and beyond who have lost loved ones to militant violence, this might resonate as a government doing its job. Yet, the tragedy is that such actions, intended to secure one population, invariably inflict pain on another.
This is the brutal arithmetic of conflict, where numbers—casualties, militants killed, strikes carried out—become the cold language of official statements. An Afghan mother mourning a child, her fast broken not by the evening meal, but by grief. A Pakistani family wondering if the strikes will finally bring them safety. A diplomat in New Delhi, choosing words carefully, hoping to nudge the region towards a different path.
The holy month of Ramadan is supposed to be a time of compassion, of looking beyond oneself, of remembering the suffering of others. This Sunday’s events were a stark reminder of how far the region still has to go. India’s statement was, in essence, a plea for that spirit—a call to stop using Afghanistan as a chessboard for proxy battles, to see the faces behind the geopolitical headlines, and to recognize that true security cannot be built on the shattered lives of innocents. In the end, the strongest condemnation was not just of the strikes themselves, but of the failure of imagination that allows such cycles of violence to continue, generation after generation.