Pakistan paid no ‘tangible’ price for Pahalgam terror attack: Congress' Jairam Ramesh

Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Jairam Ramesh on Friday criticised the Centre’s foreign policy, saying India had failed to isolate Pakistan in the aftermath of the Pahalgam terror attack.

Ramesh argued that despite the April 22, 2025, terror attack in Pahalgam, Pakistan had not paid a tangible price on the global stage. “This raises serious questions about India’s ability to mobilise international pressure and build sustained consensus against cross-border terrorism,” he added.

In a post on X, Ramesh pointed to what he described as continuing proximity between the United States and Pakistan, referring to a recent engagement in Washington DC as evidence that Islamabad had not faced any meaningful consequences internationally.

He said this reflected poorly on the diplomatic approach of the government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, adding that no amount of narrative-building could conceal the “visible gap in outcomes”.

The Congress leader also accused the government of prioritising optics over substance. Taking a swipe at the Prime Minister’s global outreach, he remarked that while the government was projecting India as a “Vishwaguru”, there was an overreliance on branding exercises and public displays of alignment with global business leaders, rather than substantive diplomatic gains.

Framing his critique through an acronym, “MODI for Maximum Optics, Damaging India, Ramesh suggested that image management had overtaken policy effectiveness under the current government.