Pakistan, July 31 -- India's post-Pahalgam response, centred around Operation Sindoor, is clearly backfiring. The Modi government's bid to project military control and political resolve has only exposed deep fractures in both.

That Pakistan-composed in diplomacy and firm in principle-has weathered the episode with credibility intact makes the uproar in India's recent monsoon session of Parliament all the more telling.

New Delhi's reaction involved cross-border drone strikes and high-decibel rhetoric. It blamed Pakistan without investigation and framed Sindoor as a surgical success. That version theatrically collapsed when Congress MP Francis George declared in Parliament that three Rafale jets were lost.

The government's response was s...