India's diplomatic discomfort has become increasingly visible as Pakistan takes centre stage in mediating between the United States and Iran, hosting high-stakes negotiations that have yielded a fragile but significant ceasefire in a conflict that has rattled the entire region.

Pakistan facilitated a two-week ceasefire announced on April 8, 2026, temporarily halting over 40 days of intense fighting. It subsequently hosted the Islamabad Talks on April 11–12, bringing together United States Vice President JD Vance and Iranian Parliamentary Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf. Pakistan's military chief, General Asim Munir, and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif have since pursued shuttle diplomacy in Tehran and Ankara to secure a second round of discussions — a process that analysts are calling the potential “Islamabad Accord.”

India, by contrast, has maintained a cautious, low-profile stance, one that has drawn sharp criticism both at home and abroad.

The depth of New Delhi's frustration surfaced during an all-party parliamentary meeting, when External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar reportedly referred to Pakistan as a “broker state” — using the Hindi word “dalal,” a term carrying deeply pejorative connotations. He argued that India has no interest in performing “errands” for superpowers and dismissed Pakistan's mediation role as mere instrumentalisation by Washington dating back to 1981.

The remark landed like a stone in still water. Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Asif called the comments “undiplomatic” and “spiteful,” while regional analysts widely described them as a sign of “epic frustration.” Indian opposition leaders, rather than defending the minister, turned the episode into an indictment of the government's foreign policy, questioning why India is absent while Pakistan commands the world's attention.

Critics at home have drawn a pointed contrast between Prime Minister Narendra Modi's “Vishwaguru” ambitions — his vision of India as a global teacher and leader — and the current reality of being, in the words of several commentators, a “mute spectator.”

India's exclusion from the mediation table did not happen by accident. A series of decisions and incidents steadily eroded its credibility as a neutral actor in the eyes.

Pakistani officials and independent observers alike suggest the mediation serves a dual purpose: bolstering Pakistan's global image at a moment of domestic economic strain, while simultaneously checking India's expanding regional influence

Pakistani officials and independent observers alike suggest the mediation serves a dual purpose: bolstering Pakistan's global image at a moment of domestic economic strain, while simultaneously checking India's expanding regional influence

The most damaging episode involved the Iranian frigate IRIS Dena, which had participated as a guest in India's MILAN 2026 naval exercises in Visakhapatnam. Shortly after leaving Indian waters, the vessel was torpedoed and sunk by a United States submarine in the Indian Ocean south of Sri Lanka, killing between 84 and 104 Iranian sailors.

Viral reports alleged that the Indian Army Chief, General Upendra Dwivedi, had shared the ship's precise position with the United States and Israeli forces — a claim that proved devastating to bilateral trust. Iran was reportedly furious at India's conspicuous failure to condemn the attack on a vessel it had just hosted.

India's “strategic silence” on the conflict more broadly reinforced Tehran's suspicions. New Delhi did not officially condemn the killing of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei or the deaths of civilians in Tehran, including more than 160 children killed in a school strike in Minab on February 28. It took five days for Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri to sign the condolence book at the Iranian Embassy, with no statement from the Prime Minister or Foreign Minister. India eventually expressed “grief” over the school attack but stopped short of formal condemnation.

India's retreat from the Chabahar Port project — once a flagship connectivity initiative with Iran — further compounded the damage. Tehran interpreted New Delhi's withdrawal, widely attributed to United States sanctions pressure, as a choice of expediency over long-term partnership, fatally undermining India's image as a dependable ally.

Controversy was also stirred by Prime Minister Modi's address to the Israeli Knesset on February 25 — just 48 hours before major Israeli–United States airstrikes on Iran. In his speech, Modi used the phrase “Israel is the fatherland and India the motherland.” Critics argued the phrasing and its timing amounted to tacit endorsement of Israel's military posture on the eve of a regional war.

International outlets, including Al Jazeera and Middle East Eye, questioned whether the visit provided political cover to the Israeli government. Opposition leaders at home mocked the “fatherland” imagery as ideologically loaded and diplomatically reckless.

The tensions took a further turn on Saturday, April 18, when Iranian gunboats opened fire on Indian-flagged vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. The Indian government summoned the Iranian Ambassador to lodge a formal protest — an extraordinary step that underscored how rapidly relations between the two countries have deteriorated.

The incident also highlighted India's acute economic vulnerability. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz has directly threatened India's oil supplies, and New Delhi has been scrambling to secure alternative sources. Its nine million workers in the Gulf region are also at risk, a factor that has driven India's public calls for “restraint, dialogue, and diplomacy.”

For Pakistan, the mediation represents a remarkable rehabilitation of its international standing. Analysts describe Islamabad as having moved with “unusual agility,” leveraging its working relationships with both Washington and Tehran to position itself as an indispensable intermediary. The Iranian delegation publicly thanked Pakistan for its facilitation, a pointed contrast to Tehran's formal protest against India over the maritime incident.

Pakistani officials and independent observers alike suggest the mediation serves a dual purpose: bolstering Pakistan's global image at a moment of domestic economic strain, while simultaneously checking India's expanding regional influence.

Underlying India's predicament is a fundamental tension in its foreign policy. Deepened strategic and defence ties with the United States and Israel have made New Delhi reluctant to criticise their military operations, even as it seeks to maintain its traditional posture of non-alignment. The result has been what analysts term “selective engagement”, swift to issue advisories protecting Indian workers from Iranian retaliatory strikes, slow to respond to the human costs of Israeli–United States actions.

India is not without leverage. It remains a major regional power with significant economic weight. But the unfolding diplomacy around the Iran–United States conflict has exposed the limits of strategic ambiguity, and the costs of being seen to take sides even by omission.

As the prospect of an Islamabad Accord draws closer, New Delhi faces a sobering question: in a region being reshaped by crisis, has India's silence spoken too loudly?

© The Friday Times