On May 7, India wakened to ‘Operation Sindoor’, a sequence of precision strikes by the armed forces at 9 websites in Pakistan and Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. This was in retaliation to the terrorist assaults in Pahalgam on April 22, during which 25 Indians and one Nepali citizen, largely vacationers, had been killed.
This was the identical week {that a} report on the Indian Wealth Divide revealed that the majority of the country earns so little that an annual earnings of simply ₹2.9 lakh places you in the prime 10%. It got here simply two months after a enterprise capital firm revealed a report that out of the 140 crore Indians, solely the prime 10% have sufficient discretionary cash to spend on non-essential gadgets.
That identical night, throughout the mock drills introduced by the Ministry of Home Affairs to examine if the country was ready towards “new and complex threats”, as an alternative of staying in throughout the blackout and studying to cover their places, many Indians thronged the streets and burst firecrackers — identical to they might to have a good time an IPL cricket match victory. Meanwhile, road distributors, a part of the backside half of the Indian inhabitants, whose nationwide earnings has fallen from 22% to 15% between 1990 and 2025, had been made to show their patriotism by shutting store for the mock drills and giving up their day by day wage.
A piece-from-home conflict
That evening and the following two days, most Indians fought a work-from-home conflict. Content creators and information channels threw a barrage of disinformation, reporting how India had captured Lahore, Karachi and even Islamabad. And how, many Indian cities had been beneath assault too.
There had been visuals of panic shopping for, throngs at ATMs to withdraw money, and jammed prepare stations and bus stations as migrant staff rushed to return to their hometowns. Simultaneously, cross-border shelling and drone assaults had been killing civilians, officers, troopers, and inflicting the destruction of homes, property and livestock in Poonch, Ferozepur, Uri, Jammu, Srinagar, Rajouri, Samba and different border districts. The villagers there have been displaced and searching for hideouts. But individuals sitting afar, experiencing the digital conflict — educated to dehumanise others by rationalising abuse of these on the socio-economic margins due to their class, caste or faith — dismissed it as ‘collateral damage’ in the conflict towards terror.
“There is a concerted attempt to whip up this [war mongering] response and now we have become used to responding in this way. In 2008, when the 26/11 attacks happened in Mumbai, some people asked to use other methods than war — which was also what the then government wanted. The present government does not have the same approach.”Srinath RaghavanAcademic and former Indian military official
Common sense was thrown for a toss. Demanding preventive as an alternative of combative strategy in conflict grew to become unpopular. Some of the WhatsApp customers peddling faux information had been now baying for blood and the escalation of army motion through the use of conflict gaming language: morale, technique, techniques, terrain, artillery, victory situations, order of battle, zeroed in. Some even advocated the use of nuclear weapons to destroy Pakistan in a couple of minutes.
There was a transparent shift in public opinion and expectations on what’s the right response to conflict — which had earlier acknowledged that escalation of armed actions causes losses to all, economically, socially and morally.
As Srinath Raghavan, a tutorial and former Indian military official, who has deeply researched India’s strategic historical past, says, “War is a continuation of politics.” He notes that the chest-thumping and bloodlusting response to conflicts has been a common pattern in the final decade. Case in level: Prime Minister Narendra Modi stating on a number of events that India’s official coverage is to hit her enemies inside their territories — one thing he lately repeated, ‘Ghar mein ghus-ghus kar marenge.’
Srinath Raghavan
| Photo Credit:
R.V. Moorthy
According to Raghavan, India noticed the identical conflict mongering response in the surgical strikes of 2016 and through the 2019 Balakot air strikes after the Pulwama assault. “There is a concerted attempt to whip up this response and now we have become used to responding in this way. In 2008, when the 26/11 attacks happened in Mumbai, some people asked to use other methods than war — which was also what the then government wanted. The present government does not have the same approach.”
Blow to the economic system
Studies reveal that the 10 most conflict-affected international locations in the world reminiscent of Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, and Venezuela misplaced, on common, 41% of their financial output on account of violence. It is estimated that the 1999 Kargil conflict value India roughly ₹15 crore per day. Escalation of violence might trigger a meals disaster or famine, like in Gaza, and even impression the IT infrastructure that facilitates WiFi-enabled digital wars.
In this gentle, the commonsense response of the individuals would have been to demand an finish to the conflict, however anybody who tried to publicly say ‘no’ to conflict was deemed not only a traitor and terror supporter, however was additionally threatened with dire penalties. Ritu Sinha, a software program techie in Hyderabad, says, “I refuse to marry a person who asks for de-escalation. It shows the weakness of that man’s character.” When requested about diplomacy and different measures to deal with terrorism and cross-border conflict, she responds that “saying no to war is discouraging and disrespecting the Indian army, and only a terror apologist would say that”.
Raghavan, nevertheless, stresses that Indians of this era are fortunate that they haven’t seen a large-scale conflict; they’ve solely seen localised army issues in particular areas — the place the individuals of that area have handled the penalties and never the total country. “People should not assume that wars are re-enactments of movie scripts. Wars are not a trivial matter, and we have to be mindful of the consequences.”
“After the 26/11 attack, the then Home Minister Shivraj Patil had to resign, but no such demands are being made by the Opposition parties this time.”Ramachandra GuhaHistorian and author
When politicians unite
In this conflict frenzy and mass hysteria, hardly any political get together has referred to as for peace. Historian and author Ramachandra Guha factors out that jingoism is emotionally overpowering, and that individuals overlook their very own plight. Now the public calculation is that “war is bad for us but worse for Pakistan”. He additionally reminds: “After the 26/11 attack, the then Home Minister Shivraj Patil had to resign, but no such demands are being made by the Opposition parties this time.”
Ramachandra Guha
| Photo Credit:
R. Ravindran
In reality, events throughout the political spectrum, be it Right, Centre or Left, have supported army actions. They are determined to show their patriotism. While individuals of anti-war peace rallies in Thrissur and Kolkata confronted a crackdown by the state governments in Kerala and West Bengal (beneath the Communist Party of India and Trinamool Congress, respectively), the rally held in assist of the armed forces by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.Okay. Stalin, from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam Opposition coalition, was allowed hundreds of individuals.
The essential query on the colossal intelligence failure that led to the barbaric terror assault in Pahalgam is now not current in public discourse. Peace activists imagine that in occasions of propaganda, dumbing down of mind, and herd mentality, there’s a shrinking of area for dialogue. Arundhati Dhuru, convener of the National Alliance of People’s Movements, recounts that when she organised Indo-Pak peace missions in the late 90s after Pokhran, Indian faculties hosted Pakistani delegations. “They were sceptical, [Pakistanis] were still ‘they’, but we had an openness to listen, talk and sit together,” she remembers. “Now, it is no longer possible. You could be lynched by your neighbour for saying no to war.”
But, at the identical time, “pitting yourself against majority pro-war sentiment is not cowardice,” reminds Ravi Nair, government director of the South Asia Human Rights Documentation Centre. “Pacifism is an act of courage. It is an informed choice.”
Where is the unbiased thinker?
In the absence of in-person dialogues and the presence of hate spewing content material on smartphones, artwork may very well be a potent software to counter conflict propaganda. For a long time, artists have inspired peace with their work globally. But it isn’t so in modern India.
“In the past decade, people have become more zombie-like, they think less for themselves and rely on what they see on social media. It requires you to be an independent thinker and use your common sense to oppose killings, war, and violence.”Orijit SenArtist
Within two days of Operation Sindoor, there was a rush by leisure corporations to register the copyright of the title, as if it had been a product launch and never a army operation. It isn’t a surprise at a time when motion pictures with slanted, sectarian, and inaccurate information about the previous and current — a few of them glorifying violence and conflict — have been rewarded commercially and by the authorities.
Orijit Sen, a graphic artist and designer, says, “In India, artists are no longer voices of dissent. This feeling that the government will come after you is everywhere. There is an overall atmosphere of fear among everyone, including artists.” He provides that there’s a manufactured mass hysteria amongst individuals the place feelings are ripped up by means of propaganda-generating factories of the ruling dispensation. “In the past decade, people have become more zombie-like, they think less for themselves and rely on what they see on social media. It requires you to be an independent thinker and use your common sense to oppose killings, war, and violence,” says Sen.
Orijit Sen
| Photo Credit:
Special association
A hypermasculine strategy
Globally, most leaders reminiscent of the U.S. President Donald Trump, Russian President Vladimir Putin and India’s personal PM Modi have customary themselves as hypermasculine leaders — of their physique language and responses. Guha factors out that the media has declared them as redeemers, and unbiased pondering individuals have fallen prey to herd mentality. “The same hypermasculine attitude and language is reflected across political ranks and files of BJP leadership, and in the responses of the street thug that lynches, tortures, and abuses people on the margins and makes hate speeches. It is no surprise that there are such masculine responses to this situation,” he says.
This was obvious in the title ‘Operation Sindoor’, the place the Indian state and its leaders projected themselves as the protectors of girls. On the afternoon of May 7, when the authorities held its first press convention, it was addressed by Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri and two ladies, Colonel Sofia Qureshi and Wing Commander Vyomika Singh. They knowledgeable that ‘Operation Sindoor was launched by the Indian Armed Forces to deliver justice to the victims of the Pahalgam terror attack and their families.’ Sindoor, vermilion, is worn by many Indian ladies of their hair parting to point out their married standing; ceasing to put on it implies widowhood. PM Modi, in his deal with to the nation on May 12, repeatedly stated that the army motion is to search justice for the ladies whose sindoor was erased.
Vikram Misri
| Photo Credit:
ANI
Colonel Sofia Qureshi (right) and Wing Commander Vyomika Singh
| Photo Credit:
AP
J. Devika, a tutorial and feminist, says, “Operation Sindoor is a hit because it upholds the fraternal social contract where women belong to men in a patriarchal system. Where killing of a man is seizing his women, in this case, the wife. Killing the husband is killing her protector. This is the base of attacking in a patriarchal society where it immediately becomes a question of honour.”
The press briefing held by two ladies officers avenging the sindoor of the widows of Pahalgam was additionally hailed as a picture of the Indian ‘empowered woman’ and ‘united India’ as a result of Colonel Sofia Qureshi is Muslim.
The Indian authorities takes a leaf from Israel and the U.S. in creating such optics to focus a selective strategy to human rights violations. Israel has been accused of ‘pinkwashing’, making an attempt to give itself a liberal veneer in its conflict on Gaza. In November 2023, a photograph of an Israeli soldier with a rainbow flag in assist of the LGBTQIA+ neighborhood appeared. Similarly, the U.S. despatched Thomas-Greenfield and Robert A. Wood, each Black Americans, as its representatives in the UN — who’ve raised their fingers to veto ceasefire resolutions for the Palestinian individuals.
Not in the title of girls
The illustration of girls and Muslims in the press briefing did little to whitewash the oppression of girls and Muslims, nevertheless, or restore the social material in modern India. An Association for Protection of Civil Rights report means that after the Pahalgam terror assault, between April 22 and May 8, 184 hate crimes towards Muslims had been reported throughout the country, out of which 106 had been instigated in retaliation to the Pahalgam terror assault. On May 13, BJP chief Vijay Shah referred to as Colonel Sophia Qureshi “sister of the same community as terrorists”.
Uttarakhand State Women Congress President Jyoti Rautela and supporters burn an effigy throughout a protest towards senior BJP chief Vijay Shah’s remarks on Col. Sofia Qureshi
| Photo Credit:
PTI
Urvashi Butalia, a feminist and writer, says that it’s value noting that in the previous, most peace-making initiatives have been made by ladies. Women in Black, an anti-war motion that began in Jerusalem in 1988 towards the Israeli occupation of Palestine and human rights violations, now maintain vigils towards any manifestation of violence, militarism and conflict throughout the world.
Similarly, in 1994, throughout the Nagaland conflict, the Naga Mothers Association fashioned a Peace Team as a part of a marketing campaign referred to as ‘Shed No More Blood’ that actively arbitrated a truce between the Indian authorities and the outfit, NSCN (IM). The group exists to date.
On May 10, when India and Pakistan’s ceasefire was declared, the collective aggression of digital conflict individuals was seen in rejecting peaceable options. The identical individuals who had been speaking about avenging ladies’s honour by means of Operation Sindoor started trolling Misri’s daughter, for offering authorized counsel to Rohingya refugees after the Foreign Secretary introduced on the authorities’s behalf that India and Pakistan agreed to cessation of army operations.
Amid this macho environment, feminists throughout India and Pakistan haven’t simply welcomed the ceasefire, but additionally referred to as ‘for a dismantling of power structures that sustain violence. The logic of war — rooted in nationalism, toxic masculinity, and colonial-era borders — must be rejected.’
Butalia says, “People think war should be the first response and will fix the problem within a week. But look at the Russia-Ukraine war and Israel-Gaza. It has been years. No wars have stopped because countries ran out of ammunition. They stopped because people sat across the table, talked and signed peace accords.”
Today, reviews of ceasefire violations proceed, as do chest thumping WhatsApp forwards, and TV and content material warriors who can’t wait for season 2.
The Delhi-based unbiased journalist and writer covers the intersection of politics, gender, and social justice.
Published – May 16, 2025 11:18 am IST
