India informed Pakistan of Operation Sindoor 30 minutes after its launch: Jaishankar

New Delhi: External affairs minister S Jaishankar informed a Parliamentary Consultative Committee on Monday that Pakistan was alerted within 30 minutes of the launch of Operation Sindoor by India.

“Within half an hour of Operation Sindoor commencing, Pakistan had been informed that only terrorist hideouts were being targeted. The cessation of operations between the two countries came into effect following direct communication between the Directors General of Military Operations (DGMOs) of India and Pakistan, initiated by Islamabad,” Jaishankar is quoted to have said.

On the night of May 7, Indian armed forces carried out precision strikes on nine terror facilities in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK). India’s motive behind informing Pakistan about the strikes was to clarify that no military or government infrastructure had been targetted.

Speaking on foreign interference, especially the US’s self-proclaimed role, Jaishankar made it clear that India’s stance was communicated in less than ten words: “They fire, we fire. They stop, we stop”. The minister also added that when the US Secretary of State conveyed intelligence suggesting Pakistan might launch a large-scale retaliation, India responded firmly: “If Pakistan escalates, we are ready to respond in kind”.

The minister’s clarification came days after a political row erupted over Congress MP and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi’s accusations that India informed Pakistan of the attack in advance. He said that this was a ‘crime’ and wanted to know how many aircraft India lost due to this decision.

“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?” Gandhi said in a post on X.

The Ministry of External Affairs refuted Rahul Gandhi’s claim, calling it ‘utter misrepresentation of facts.’ “EAM Jaishankar had stated that we 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 ministry had said.

Monday’s meeting was chaired by Jaishankar to discuss Operation Sindoor and cross-border terrorism. It was attended by MPs, including K C Venugopal, Manish Tewari, Mukul Wasnik, Priyanka Chaturvedi, Aparajita Sarangi and Gurjeet Singh Aujla.