India’s foreign policy post-2014 lacks direction, says Mani Shankar Aiyar

New Delhi: Senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar on Saturday strongly criticised India’s foreign policy approach since 2014, alleging that the government has lacked a coherent diplomatic direction and that its “scattered strategy” has failed to produce any substantial outcomes.

In a pointed attack on the Centre’s global strategy, Aiyar said it is essential for India to present itself as self-reliant and not desperate for friendships, adding that building balanced international relationships benefits all parties involved.

“It seems that after 2014, we made some mistakes in the diplomatic direction — we tried to show one face to Pakistan, another to China, adopted a different policy for Russia and another for Europe and completely different for the US. But no meaningful result comes out of such a scattered strategy,” he said in an interview with IANS.

“We have to show the world that we are free and we are not running after someone to be their friend. It’s for the betterment of the two countries to maintain good relations,” Aiyar said.

He claimed that India’s diplomacy “lacks knowledge and direction” and criticised what he described as an inconsistent approach to major global players.

“It is not a good foreign policy to have one kind of relationship with China, and the opposite with the US,” Aiyar added.

He also questioned India’s unconditional support for a few countries without evaluating the global implications.

“Despite the tragedy that is happening in Gaza, we openly supported Israel, America’s closest ally, but we are not ready to say anything about any wrong step taken by America or Israel,” he said.

Referring to the government’s diplomatic initiative ‘Operation Sindoor’, during which several Indian leaders, including Congress MP Shashi Tharoor, visited multiple countries to expose Pakistan’s role in terrorism, Aiyar claimed the outreach failed to make an impact.

“Shashi Tharoor and his friends can roam around as much as they want, but apart from Israel, no one else has said that Pakistan was behind the Pahalgam terror attack. Everyone is condemning the terrorism, but no one is willing to blame Pakistan,” he said.

Aiyar also accused the government of lacking the courage to call out misinformation from global powers.

“Trump has claimed several times that the US brokered the ceasefire agreement between India and Pakistan, but our government is not ready to say that he is lying. The government does not dare to speak the truth,” he remarked.

Highlighting contradictions in the government’s approach, Aiyar questioned why dialogue with Pakistan remains off the table while engagement with China has resumed.

“The Chinese Army was there with the Pakistani Air Force during the conflict. You are ready to talk to China, so why not talk to Pakistan? PM Modi says that this is not an era of war, so why are we fighting with Pakistan? He says that dialogue and diplomacy are the only way, but we don’t engage with dialogue or diplomacy with Pakistan. With China, the dialogue started recently,” he said.

“Our diplomacy neither has knowledge of principles nor a clear goal, then what kind of diplomacy and foreign policy is this?” Aiyar added.

IANS