India on Monday issued a sharp and categorical rejection of anti-India references in resolutions adopted at the 52nd session of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation's Council of Foreign Ministers, held in Baghdad on October 17 and 18, accusing Pakistan of orchestrating the references and of misusing the grouping for what it described as a "bigoted agenda".
The statement, released by Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal and also posted by the official @MEAIndia handle, dismissed the OIC's references concerning Jammu and Kashmir as well as insinuations of Islamophobia against India.
"We categorically reject the anti-India references in the resolutions of the OIC Council of Foreign Ministers' Meeting held in Baghdad on October 17-18," the statement said. "The references to India are malicious, biased, and false, and have been orchestrated by Pakistan. We are disappointed that the OIC has once again allowed itself to be misused by Pakistan for its bigoted agenda."
The MEA underlined that India does not recognise any standing of the OIC to pronounce on matters it regards as strictly domestic.
"As we have said in the past, the OIC has no locus standi whatsoever to comment on matters that are strictly internal to India," the spokesperson said, reiterating New Delhi's long-held position that the Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh are "integral and inalienable parts of India" and that "politically motivated propaganda can never alter this reality".
The statement went further, questioning the credibility of the grouping itself. "The OIC's repeated endorsement of patently malicious propaganda and narratives peddled by Pakistan raises serious questions about its credibility and integrity," it said.
India's rebuttal followed its familiar template for responding to OIC statements on Kashmir. New Delhi has consistently maintained that Pakistan uses the OIC's Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir — a forum of which Pakistan is a member and India is not — to push resolutions critical of India, and that the grouping has no locus standi on the matter.
Officials in South Block have pointed out that India is not a member of the OIC, while Pakistan has repeatedly leveraged the platform to internationalise the Kashmir issue, a practice India has denounced as propaganda over successive ministerial meetings.
In the Monday statement, the MEA also reiterated India's stated position on what it considers the outstanding issues relating to Jammu and Kashmir: that Pakistan must vacate the areas it holds under what India describes as illegal and forcible occupation, and that it must cease its continued support to cross-border terrorism. That framing has been a constant in India's responses to OIC pronouncements on Kashmir, placing the onus squarely on Islamabad rather than New Delhi.
The statement asserted that since the abrogation of Article 370, Jammu and Kashmir has witnessed economic growth driven by infrastructure development, tourism and improved connectivity.
New Delhi has frequently cited rising tourist footfall, new road and rail projects, and investment inflows into the Union Territory as evidence that normalcy and development have returned to the region, a narrative it contrasts with what it describes as Pakistan's attempts to keep the issue alive in international forums.
In a pointed counter-accusation, the MEA turned the spotlight on Pakistan's own conduct in the areas of Jammu and Kashmir under its control. It accused Islamabad of unleashing "violence, repression and brutality on civilian protesters, killing scores of them, including women and children" in Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, and said that "no amount of media blackout has been able to hide these grave violations of human rights".
The statement also took aim at the OIC resolutions' insinuations about Islamophobia in India, describing them as a "desperate attempt by Pakistan to divert international attention from its own appalling record of minority persecution and sectarian violence", while additionally pointing to governance failure and political instability in Pakistan.
The accusation of religious intolerance against India, the MEA said, was itself an instrument crafted in Islamabad to distract global attention from conditions within Pakistan.
The exchange fits a well-established pattern in India-Pakistan diplomacy. The OIC's Council of Foreign Ministers, which meets annually, has routinely adopted resolutions on Jammu and Kashmir at Pakistan's urging, and India has responded each time with nearly identical language — categorically rejecting the references, denying the OIC any locus standi, and accusing Pakistan of orchestrating them.
What distinguishes the latest statement is its unusually strong language on the OIC's institutional credibility, suggesting a growing frustration in New Delhi that the grouping continues to provide a platform for what India views as Pakistan's anti-India campaign despite India's repeated protests.
For Pakistan, the OIC has long been the most dependable multilateral venue for keeping the Kashmir issue on the international agenda. India, which is not a member, has no vote in its proceedings but has on occasion sought observer engagement with the grouping, most notably when the then External Affairs Minister was invited as a guest of honour at the OIC foreign ministers' meeting in 2019.
That engagement, however, did not alter the OIC's posture on Kashmir resolutions, and India has since largely treated the grouping's statements on the issue as reflexive and Pakistan-driven.
Analysts note that India's unusually sharp tone — including the accusation of a "bigoted agenda" and the direct questioning of the OIC's credibility and integrity — reflects New Delhi's confidence that its position on Kashmir finds broad international acceptance, particularly among major powers, and that the OIC resolutions therefore carry limited weight beyond their signalling value to a domestic Pakistani audience.
At the same time, the repeated nature of the exchanges underscores how entrenched the diplomatic ritual has become: Islamabad secures a resolution, New Delhi rejects it in the strongest terms, and both sides use the episode to speak to their respective domestic constituencies.
The MEA statement, in its concluding emphasis, made clear that India regards the matter as closed as far as sovereignty is concerned. With the references in the Baghdad resolutions dismissed as malicious, biased and false, and with the OIC's standing to comment denied outright, New Delhi has signalled that no amount of multilateral posturing will shift its position on the status of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh as integral parts of the country.
The development is likely to be followed by a response from Islamabad, which has in the past rejected India's accusations and defended the OIC's role in highlighting the situation in Kashmir. Whether the latest round of verbal sparring changes anything on the ground remains to be seen, but for now, both sides have restated their positions with customary vigour, and the diplomatic deadlock over Kashmir at the OIC shows no sign of easing.
(Reporting based on The Hindu, NDTV, The New Indian Express and The Economic Times.)