Operations against Pakistan ‘only in abeyance’: PM Modi

In his first address to the nation after Operation Sindoor, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday, 12 May, said operations against Pakistan have only been kept in abeyance and the future will depend on their behaviour.

The prime minister termed the Pahalgam attack as the most “barbaric face of terrorism”, but the enemy, he said, has now realised the consequences.

Operation Sindoor, he said, was not just a name — the world saw India’s resolve and more than a hundred terrorists killed.

“India will not tolerate any nuclear blackmail,” he said, presumably referring to widely aired concerns about military actions potentially testing the nuclear threshold. “We have only kept in abeyance our operations against Pakistan; the future will depend on their behaviour. A new line has been drawn,” he said, indicating that Operation Sindoor had set a new paradigm to deal with terrorism.

Modi said India will not see terrorists and their state sponsors separately. “This is not an era of war,” he said, referring to a statement he’d made earlier, urging Russia and Ukraine to cease and desist, “but it is also not an era of terrorism”.

“Pakistan has to dismantle its terror infrastructure. There is no other way to peace,” the prime minister said.

He also advised Pakistan to root out terrorism for its own safety, not just at India's behest: "The terrorists they have been feeding and nurturing all these years will swallow Pakistan itself. If Pakistan wants to survive, it will have to root out terrorism."

He also noted that terror and trade, terror and talks cannot go together, that blood and water cannot flow together (indicating presumably the Indus Water Treaty being in abeyance).

Modi's assertions about not doing trade with Pakistan came minutes after US president Donald Trump claimed to the media that he told India and Pakistan that his administration will do trade with them only if they end the conflict.

"Any talks with Pakistan can happen only on terrorism and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir," the prime minister added, in further contradiction to an earlier claim of the POTUS that India and Pakistan had also agreed to wider talks in the wake of the ceasefire declaration.

Saluting the security forces, PM Modi dedicated their bravery to India’s mothers, sisters and daughters.

With PTI inputs. More highlights of his speech and the day's events in our live blog linked below.