Till then, the Modi government was getting along fine with periodic releases of Prime Minister Modi in a huddle with the three armed services chiefs and Raksha Mantri Rajnath Singh listening intently to every word. National Security Advisor Ajit Doval also lent a patient ear along with the 'CDS' though in the last such photo-op, Doval’s downcast face did tell a story all its own.

Long and short is, but for President Donald Trump, India's millions wouldn't have been told of the “high-value terrorists” killed in Bahawalpur and Muridke. They wouldn’t have been shown the “before and after” satellite pictures of bombed out Pakistani airbases. They wouldn’t have known that the Indian Air Force brought the Pakistani Army-ISI establishment to its knees and left the Pakistani media scrambling.

But, finally, irrevocably, President Trump forced Prime Minister Modi to agree to his terms, leaving it to the Indian armed forces to take charge of not only the situation but also of the narrative. The time for civilians lording it over national security was over when three top operations officers took to the podium, explained the nitty-gritty, and answered questions.

Story of the week: Was Prime Minister Modi out of his depth? Did he abdicate his mandate to United States President Donald Trump? Did Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is also America’s NSA for the time-being, start speaking for S. Jaishankar, India’s Foreign Minister, at least for a night and a day? Did NSA Ajit Doval also succumb to the same viral Trump contagion?

It was Secretary of State Marco Rubio who “worked the phones the entire night (entire day in the United States)” to cajole, threaten Pakistan and get India to agree to a US-brokered ceasefire. Did Prime Minister Modi and EAM Jaishankar cave in? NSA Ajit Doval appeared lost in the picture.

President Trump posted on ‘Truth Social’ the news of the ceasefire, calling it "common sense." Is President Trump ‘Vishwaguru” and Prime Minister Narendra Modi nowhere even close? And, if anybody took world peace seriously, it wasn’t Prime Minister Modi, who had famously said, "This is not an era of war."

Again, if anybody’s gotten closer to a Nobel Peace, it’s not ‘Modi hai toh mumkin hai’. Is the end of Modi Raj close? The Prime Minister's image has developed cracks and no amount of Arnab Goswami monologues will serve as panacea. Did Prime Minister Modi lose his nerve for just long enough for President Trump to wrap his pal round his little finger?

Can Modi live down the massive setback to his future plans? What choice does Modi have? Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, feigning outrage, lamented the “internationalization of Kashmir.” Ever since the ceasefire, Prime Minister Modi has been quiet. The Kashmir issue has been "internationalized" and Pakistan will be making a big hue and cry every now and then, reminding Trump of his promise.

India has refuted talk of any "internationalizing of Kashmir" but President Trump is a busybody and India has lost the formidable standing Prime Minister Modi has had with President Trump. The US President is not beyond getting nasty in the trenches as Ukraine President Zelenskyy would attest.

Again, it was President Trump who is continuing to call the shots, offering the USA’s good office for solving the "1000-year-old" Kashmir problem. The reality is the India-Pakistan war has now got Trump and the United States on India’s tail. Prime Minister Modi has been hyphenated to Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, somebody who needs the steady hand of the USA to be on the straight and narrow.

President Trump is the one who got Pakistan the IMF billions and President Trump is the one who’s building Trump towers in Mumbai and Gurugram. Trump is nobody's friend and Trump maneuvered and plotted Modi's abdication of taking decisions for India.

Marco Rubio's reasoning that nuclear-armed Pakistan was getting edgy for the entire world's comfort was a bogey. The Pakistanis are too full of hubris to look and sound scared of nuclear Armageddon. More likely, Trump, Vance and Marco Rubio cooked up the mess for Modi's consumption.

The Modi dispensation can do any number of cartwheels, but President Trump has got a fat toe in the Kashmir door and he won’t stop interfering in "India's internal affairs". Trump will keep asking for tat from India for every Pakistani tit. There will even be times when Trump will get in Modi's hair and Modi would get to know what splitting hair is all about.

Naturally, the Pakistanis are jubilant. Doubly jubilant! With the USA's intervention, Trump also signed the death warrant on the Simla Accord. And the Line of Control is out of India's control! Wannabe terrorists will walk in and out of J&K as if on a morning walk. Modi not only snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in the “three-day war”, he also forfeited the takeover of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir!

Omar Abdullah posted on ‘X’ on the night of the violation of the ceasefire, “What the hell is happening, is there a ceasefire or isn’t there one?” Abdullah snatched the words right out of the mouths of a billion stunned Indians. Only a Prime Minister such as Modi can be so contradictory in his pronouncements and in his actions!

Operation Sindoor was a resounding success and a continuing one at that. "It won't stop," said Air Marshal AK Bharti. The fact is that, despite Pakistan left sweating and swearing, and allowing Trump to butt into India’s internal affairs, nothing could throw Op Sindoor into disarray.

The unseemly hurry to empty madrasas before the Indian armed forces attacked wasn't for nothing. But by agreeing to the Trump-brokered "ceasefire", Prime Minister Modi showed that he could not hold on to his end of the bargain made to the people of India. Is it time to divorce Modi and TINA (there's no alternative [to Modi])? From Vice President JD Vance's “fundamentally none of our business” to Marco Rubio, in his role as NSA, "working the phones", President Trump breached Prime Minister Modi's defences till there was nothing left. (IPA Service)