India, May 8 -- India's Operation Sindoor struck nine targets in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the massacre of 26 tourists in Pahalgam on April 22. Along with the suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), announced soon after the terrorist attack, Operation Sindoor, launched Wednesday 1.05am suggests a qualitative shift in India-Pakistan relations. The strikes, described by the ministry of defence as "focused, measured and non-escalatory in nature", and the decision to suspend the 1960 IWT that had survived several wars and alarms, is a pointer to that. Pakistan has, all this while, believed it could, to paraphrase Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi's words, allow blood and water to flow together. Now we have arrived at crunch time. The evocative codename of the operation, Sindoor (vermillion) is a poignant reference to the women whose spouses were heartlessly gunned down on the Baisaran meadow on April 22. The Indian attacks have for the first time struck at targets deep inside Pakistan. In the process, they have not hesitated to strike at the very heads of the snakes being nurtured by the Pakistan army in Muridke where the Lashkar-e-Taiba is headquartered, and Bhawalpur, from where the Jaish-e-Muhammad operates. As an outcome of Pahalgam, not only have the two countries virtually terminated trade, diplomatic relations, and sporting links, but in keeping with the digital age, they have blocked each other on social media and the internet. On Tuesday, India maintained psychological pressure on Pakistan by pausing water flows, announcing military and civil defence drills. It publicised the several meetings of PM Modi with senior military and security officials. Earlier, with the so-called surgical strikes of 2016 and the Balakot attack of 2019, India had laid down a red line in relation to terrorism that made it almost certain that New Delhi would hit Pakistan militarily for the Pahalgam outrage. The hard-line posture that the Modi government had undertaken with regard to terrorism and separatism in Jammu and Kashmir since 2017 would have lost credibility if it had not done so given the stark brutality of the act that deliberately targeted civilians. However, an important caveat to the strikes was that the operations were limited in scope. As in 2016 and 2019, the Indian strikes were aimed at the terrorist infrastructure and avoided targeting any Pakistani military facilities. Though India was now facing a qualitatively fraught situation, it ensured that it hit hard, but did so, as its press release noted, with "considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution". The current crisis comes layered upon political developments in both countries in recent years-the consolidation of the BJP in India and the collapse of the civilian political system in Pakistan. There are other strands to it as well -the derogation of Article 370 in Jammu & Kashmir and the continuing resort to cross-border attacks by the Pakistan military through its proxy forces in the last couple of years. Islamabad has long pursued the goal of seeking effective parity with India in everything, but economic growth. To this end, it has, in the last 45 years, used proxy war as an instrument of State policy. Just as India felt the compulsion to act under Operation Sindoor, Pakistan will almost certainly retaliate in some form. Just what targets it will choose is the question since there is no comparable terrorist infrastructure in India. However, if it strikes at Indian military and civilian targets, New Delhi may feel compelled to conduct another round of strikes. In the past, India lacked the military or economic heft to shape Pakistani policy effectively, so it sought to manage relations at the lowest level of violence. But now, it has become exasperated and is seeking more drastic options. Indian policy towards Pakistan was based on a futile assumption that direct dialogue would somehow bring Islamabad around. But the current events will bring a qualitative change, one that will be less tolerant of terror attacks and readier to contemplate drastic action. India's policy now needs to be much more dynamic and flexible and must incorporate drastic measures like military strikes, and suspension of IWT, with bilateral and multi-lateral diplomacy on a reward and punishment matrix to help us to reduce and eventually eliminate the violence that we confront from our neighbour. This cannot happen overnight, but it is important to formulate a new long-term policy and work along it. A country that is marching towards regional and eventually global status as a major power simply cannot afford to have a large swathe of its border under the control of a hostile power. Pakistan's self-professed aim in its proxy war is to grab Kashmir from India. Pakistan army chief Syed Asim Munir recently termed it the "jugular vein" of the country. So here is a suggestion: The Kashmir Pakistan wants is in our control, giving us policy primacy there. New Delhi needs a Kashmir policy that makes Kashmir more deeply attached to India. Derogating Article 370 is a step, largely symbolic. We need to win the real battle, for Kashmiri hearts and minds. The Pahalgam fallout provides a particularly good opportunity to do so, but it can best be done by rigorously implementing due process and the rule of law. But the Kashmir administration, which is undertaking mass arrests and demolishing houses of unconnected militants, seems to be bent on undermining what should be our best course....