India Rebuts America’s Ceasefire Spin

India has once again rejected US President Donald Trump’s claim that his administration played a role in brokering the May 10 ceasefire between India and Pakistan. The Ministry of External Affairs has clarified that the ceasefire emerged from direct communication between the Directors General of Military Operations of the two countries and did not involve any discussion of trade incentives or tariffs.

“The issue of trade or tariffs did not come up in any of the discussions,” MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal has said, in what marks the government’s second public rebuttal of the Trump administration’s attempt to link the ceasefire to American trade policy. Jaiswal was responding to fresh remarks by US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, who told the US Court of International Trade that President Trump had offered India and Pakistan access to American markets to prevent further escalation along the Line of Control. This latest claim follows a pattern of retrospective framing by the Trump administration, with officials attempting to cast unilateral executive decisions on tariffs as instruments of geopolitical statecraft.

The court, however, found that the administration had overstepped its authority. On May 28, 2025, a three-judge panel ruled that the tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) were unlawful, stating that the act did not grant the president the power to unilaterally impose such broad tariffs.

The MEA’s firm denial of any trade-related negotiation is not just a matter of diplomatic record—it is also a statement of principle. At a time when global platforms are being used to project alternative versions of events, India is actively working to shape the narrative on its own terms.

To that end, the government has launched an expansive diplomatic campaign. Seven all-party parliamentary delegations have been dispatched to 25 countries, including all five permanent members of the UN Security Council and several other influential powers. The ten-day effort, comprising 51 political leaders and eight former ambassadors, is designed to counter Pakistan’s narrative and reinforce India’s zero-tolerance position in global capitals. These delegations are briefing foreign governments, presenting documentation of cross-border terror, and reiterating that India’s internal security decisions are sovereign, unmediated, and beyond negotiation.

India has also clarified that the Indus Waters Treaty, long seen as a rare pillar of uninterrupted cooperation between India and Pakistan, remains in abeyance. Following the April 22 terrorist attack in Pahalgam, India declared that the “goodwill and mutual trust” underpinning the Treaty had been irreparably damaged. The Treaty, brokered in 1960 by the World Bank, is unlikely to be revived until Pakistan demonstrates “concrete and irreversible” action to dismantle its terror infrastructure, India has said.

India’s firm denial of Trump’s claims and its stance on the water treaty with Pakistan point to a recalibration. India is no longer willing to compartmentalise diplomacy into insulated tracks where trade, water, and terror are treated as unrelated. Nor is it prepared to indulge what it sees as opportunistic misreadings of its security decisions by foreign leaders or administrations.

2025 India-Pakistan warde-escalate tensionsDonald TrumpNews BriefOperation SindoorWeb Exclusive