Sometimes the first sign of a crisis arrives not in the headlines but in the kitchen. A few days ago, my wife received a polite message from the organisers of a conference she plans to attend. They expressed regret that they would not be able to serve the traditional Kerala breakfast—no idli, dosa or puttu with kadala curry. Participants would instead have to be satisfied with sandwiches and other simple items.

At first glance, the message sounded almost comical. Kerala conferences without Kerala breakfast are like weddings without a bride. But the explanation was sobering. Cooking gas had become scarce, and the organisers could not risk planning a menu that depended on it.

By now, you would have guessed the larger story behind that apologetic message. India is in the grip of a cooking gas crisis. In state after state, city after city, and village after village, people are standing in queues for LPG cylinders. In some places, the queues begin before dawn. In others, they stretch endlessly outside distribution centres like ration lines from another era.

It was in 2016 that Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a scheme to popularise the use of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) across the country. The intention was laudable. The government wanted to wean rural households away from firewood and cow dung cakes, which had been the principal sources of cooking fuel in millions of homes.

For women in particular, LPG was a small revolution. For generations, cooking had begun long before the first grain of rice was washed. Women had to collect firewood from fields or forests, chop it into smaller pieces, and gather cow dung to mix with hay and shape into large, round cakes. These cakes would then be dried in the sun so that they could burn easily when the time came to cook.

It was back-breaking labour hidden behind the romantic notion of the "traditional kitchen." When LPG cylinders arrived, women felt liberated. Cooking became quicker and cleaner. There was less smoke to irritate the eyes and lungs. Meals could be prepared without spending hours collecting fuel.

But their happiness did not last long. As LPG prices began climbing steadily—except during election seasons—many households discovered that the cylinders had become unaffordable. Subsidies shrank, prices rose, and the arithmetic of survival returned. Gradually, the old routines came back.

In many huts across rural India, the LPG cylinder became an expensive piece of furniture. A wooden plank placed on top converted it into a makeshift bench. It was a silent reminder that dreams sometimes visit briefly and then depart. Today, the crisis has taken another turn.

Roadside eateries and small restaurants are discovering, to their horror, that LPG cylinders in the black market have allegedly reached prices of ?3000 to 4000. For businesses operating on thin margins, such costs are devastating. Inevitably, the price of cooked food will rise.

Our traders, after all, believe deeply in the concept of Shubh Laabh—sacred profit. Unfortunately, the pursuit of sacred profit often slides effortlessly into profiteering.

The situation reminds me of an assignment I received many years ago from Himadri Danda, the editor of the short-lived magazine Contour, which was part of the Hindustan Times stable. This was in the late 1970s. He asked me to travel to Raigarh, then in Madhya Pradesh and now part of Chhattisgarh, to investigate a grain merchant who had been arrested for hoarding foodgrain.

The merchant had been accused of creating artificial scarcity in order to raise prices and maximise profits. When I reached Raigarh, the man was already in jail, so I could not interview him. But I did manage to photograph his godown—a cavernous warehouse stacked with grain bags, while ordinary people struggled to buy basic food.

Looking back, one wonders whether something similar is happening today with LPG cylinders in our own capital city. So far, I personally have not been affected. My house has a piped gas connection. But that offers no guarantee about the future. If the present geopolitical tensions escalate further, even piped gas may not remain immune.

The immediate cause of anxiety is the continuing war involving Iran. If the conflict drags on for a few more weeks, crude oil prices could easily touch $200 per barrel. For a country like India, which imports most of its energy, the consequences would be severe. Petrol, diesel, cooking gas, transportation, food—everything would become more expensive.

Against this backdrop, one must reflect on the recent visit of Narendra Modi to Israel just two days before the war began. What exactly was the purpose of that visit? His friend, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his political soulmate, US President Donald Trump, had already decided on their course of action against Tehran. The world now knows that the attack on Iran was carefully coordinated.

Yet we saw images of Modi laughing heartily with Netanyahu at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport. One wonders what joke "Bibi" and his wife cracked that made the Indian Prime Minister laugh so freely at that moment of gathering storm. For a change, Netanyahu seemed eager to embrace Modi warmly.

The scene reminded me of an episode from the Mahabharata. The blind king Dhritarashtra once attempted to embrace Bhima in a moment of deceptive affection. Krishna sensed danger and substituted an iron statue in Bhima's place. Dhritarashtra's embrace crushed the statue into pieces. Bhima escaped. The statue did not.

In this case, however, Modi appeared quite willing to accept Netanyahu's embrace. Unfortunately, the political consequences have not been as gentle. Social media is now flooded with memes lampooning the spectacle. The carefully cultivated image of India's most decisive and courageous Prime Minister seems somewhat diminished.

The more serious question is whether Modi allowed himself to become a pawn in Netanyahu's geopolitical game. The moment of truth arrived on February 28, when Trump and Netanyahu launched their coordinated attack on Iran. For nearly four decades, Netanyahu has repeated a familiar claim—that Iran is on the verge of developing nuclear weapons.

"The Iranians can assemble a nuclear bomb within weeks, if not days," he has said countless times. Trump, never known for patience with nuance, swallowed this narrative wholeheartedly. Last June, he even ordered bombing raids on Iranian nuclear infrastructure and triumphantly declared that Iran's nuclear capability had been destroyed. If that were true, one must ask: what exactly was left to destroy in this new war?

Iran retaliated strongly, causing serious damage to American installations in West Asia. The situation spiralled rapidly into open conflict. Throughout this period, one expected India—long known for its independent foreign policy—to speak with clarity. Instead, New Delhi remained conspicuously silent.

The Prime Minister, who can find time to congratulate a kabaddi champion from Mayiladuthurai in poll-bound Tamil Nadu on his X handle, and who can rush to Guruvayoor to bless a wedding ceremony, somehow found no time to condemn the attack on Iran. This silence is particularly puzzling when one considers the long history between India and Persia, as Iran was once known.

Centuries ago, when Zoroastrians faced persecution in Persia, India welcomed them with open arms. The Parsis became one of the most productive communities in the country. From Jamsetji Tata, the founder of India's great industrial empire, to the eminent jurist Fali S. Nariman, their contribution has been extraordinary. Other communities with Iranian roots—the Bohras and the Bahais—also flourish in India. The Bahai Lotus Temple in Delhi stands today as one of the architectural marvels of the modern era.

During the reign of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran, thousands of Iranian students came to Indian universities for higher education. The Shah himself had come to power after a dramatic political upheaval. His predecessor, Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, had committed the unforgivable crime of declaring that Iran's oil wealth belonged to the Iranian people rather than to British or American companies. Soon after, he was overthrown in a coup backed by foreign powers.

History, however, has a way of turning tables. In 1979, the Islamic Revolution toppled the Shah. The new regime seized the American embassy in Tehran and held its staff hostage for 444 days—an episode that deeply humiliated Washington. Since then, the US has sought repeatedly to weaken or isolate Iran, often using regional allies such as Iraq and Israel. But the Iranians have proved to be a tough people.

During the current conflict, Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed in a strike early in the war. It amounted to the assassination of a head of state. One would have expected India to condemn such an act unequivocally. After all, Modi himself had met Khamenei in the past. India has benefited from Iranian goodwill in several ways. Despite American sanctions, Iran sold oil to India at concessional rates for many years. When the Kashmir issue occasionally surfaced in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Iran often adopted a relatively balanced stance.

Yet when news of Khamenei's death spread, New Delhi said nothing. The Iranian embassy in Delhi opened a condolence register for visiting dignitaries. Neither the Prime Minister nor the Defence Minister appeared there. Only after more than 100 hours had passed—and after the world noticed the awkward silence—did the government send the Foreign Secretary, not Foreign Minister, to sign the register. What message did that delay send to the world?

Did it suggest that India was pursuing an independent foreign policy? Or did it create the impression that New Delhi tacitly approved the war? This is not the first time such hesitation has been visible. When Russia invaded Ukraine three years ago, India adopted a carefully calibrated neutrality. The reason was obvious: India was buying discounted oil from Moscow.

Once Trump raised the issue publicly, New Delhi adjusted its tone. But neutrality is not always wisdom. When the choice is between right and wrong, truth and falsehood, aggression and restraint, silence becomes a form of complicity. Consider another troubling episode.

An Iranian naval vessel that had participated in a naval exercise in Visakhapatnam was returning home when it was torpedoed by American forces shortly after leaving Indian waters. The attack took place in international waters, thousands of kilometres away from Iran itself. Sri Lankan authorities helped rescue many of the sailors.

Yet New Delhi did not utter a word of protest. Compare that with Spain, a country far smaller than India in population, military strength, and economic power. Spain openly criticised Trump for destabilising world trade and international peace. Courage, it appears, is not measured only by GDP or nuclear weapons.

The Indian government's explanation in Parliament, delivered by the foreign minister, seemed more like an exercise in justification than diplomacy. India supported a United Nations resolution condemning Iran's retaliation against countries hosting American bases in West Asia. But there was no parallel criticism of the initial attack on Iran. What exactly was Iran supposed to do?

If a humble cat is trapped in a cage and beaten relentlessly, the moment it is released, it will instinctively pounce on its tormentor. That is not politics; it is basic animal instinct. Iran reacted in precisely that way.

Today, Tehran has reportedly placed three conditions for ending the war: reparations for the damage caused, guarantees against future attacks, and the freedom to pursue its national policies without external interference. Are these demands unreasonable?

If India were in a similar position—bombed, sanctioned, threatened—would it behave differently? In the end, the crisis of LPG cylinders in our kitchens and the crisis of diplomacy in our foreign policy are not entirely unrelated. Both reveal the consequences of decisions taken far away from the lives of ordinary people.

Wars fought in distant deserts eventually show up in the price of a cooking cylinder in a small Indian town. And when a country hesitates to speak clearly in defence of principles, it risks losing something more valuable than oil or gas. It risks losing its voice.