By Sushil Kutty
Congress party’s Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor’s roar is unlikely to pierce Congress eardrums. No, but fielding a former BJP uproot to take on Tharoor’s eloquence does speak of a bankruptcy of credible leaders in the grand old party. Does Tharoor give the impression of ‘irreplaceable’? You may not be able to say that about Rahul Gandhi, but Udit Raj? C’mon, that’s stretching the imagination.
Shashi Tharoor is being trolled by “zealots”. He was also irritated that “trolls” had been set upon him. Pawan Khera being one and Supriya Shrinate another. The third, of course, the irrepressible Udit Raj, who had switched to the Congress after making his presence unfelt in the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Udit Raj doesn’t stick to the grand old Oxford Dictionary, but his brand of spoken English can make even a wordsmith like Shashi Tharoor scrambling for a Webster’s Dictionary. Yes, amidst “rising tensions within the Congress”, Tharoor is paying a price for being too much in demand outside Congress circles, partly for his eloquence in the King’s English and partly because of his impatience with the Congress.
Tharoor is being courted by no less than Prime Minister Narendra Modi, himself. It started with Tharoor at the Adani-built port opening in Thiruvananthapuram where PM Modi was centre-piece, and then with Tharoor recruited to head a delegation of terror-busters to tell the world of the terror-nester, Pakistan.
Tharoor was not in the Congress list of Congress leaders that the Congress chose for the delegations, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi wanted to do a Nehru (who recruited Atal Bihari Vajpayee to run a similar errand) and Shashi Tharoor was chosen to do an Atal for Modi!
Talk of following the leader, which Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been at ever since he became Prime Minister and made Jawaharlal Nehru his muse and person of interest.
Thus Tharoor found himself leading an all-party delegation of parliamentarians to the United States and countries near-about, offering them disturbing glimpses of terror-hub Pakistan. On May 28, it was the turn of Guyana where Tharoor and his delegation spread the word that Pakistan never took terrorism with a pinch of salt.
Late in the evening, Tharoor took to ‘X’ and wrote of “trolls” and “zealots” in the Congress without naming the Congress. But people knew, especially those in the saffron party. The BJP is completely bowled over by Tharoor and there are reports alleging that Tharoor might move to the BJP if he hasn’t already.
“The BJP has rallied around opposition MP Shashi Tharoor, who is facing criticism from his own colleagues over remarks made during an international delegation visit,” said one report. With Udit Raj at the vanguard of the attack, the Congress is not ready to forgive Tharoor for “lauding India’s recent counterterror strikes” in Pakistan.
NDA leaders are reacting. “Why shouldn’t people question the Congress’s stance on national interest?” Union Minister for Minority Affairs Kiren Rijiju asked, sharing a video:“Congress ka haath kis ke sath? Kya Congress party mein desh ke liye bolna mana hai? We Indians must speak in one voice in crucial time at least,” he posted in Hindi on ‘X’.
“What does the Congress party want & how much they really care for the country? Should the Indian MPs go to foreign nation and speak against India and its Prime Minister? There’s limit to political desperation!” Rijiju asked in the language Tharoor is a master at.
Other BJP leaders echoed Rijiju with some of them asking if Udit Raj was after Tharoor at the instigation of and influence of Rahul Gandhi and that Tharoor was being attacked because he kept India first and not Gandhi family first!
Tharoor has been criticizing the Congress’ “hypocrisy”, supporting the armed forces on the one hand while not saying a word against Pakistan on the other hand. Tharoor also spoke well of India’s counter-terrorism efforts under Modi. “What has changed in recent years is that the terrorists have realised they will have a price to pay; on that, let there be no doubt!” he said in Panama.
And then he compounded the mistake by asserting that the Indian Army breached the LoC for the first time since independence under Modi. “That was already something we had not done before,” he said.”This time we have not only gone beyond the Line of Control and the international border, we have struck at the Punjabi heartland of Pakistan by hitting terror bases, training centres, and terror headquarters in nine places.”
Udit Raj fumed at Tharoor’s betrayal. “How could you denigrate the golden history of Congress by saying that before PM Modi, India never crossed LOC and the international border?” Raj posted on X. “Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has become the super spokesperson of the BJP, speaking in favour of PM Modi and his government.”
What can Tharoor do and what’s in store for Tharoor? He can quit the Congress and join the BJP, bet on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Tharoor wants to be Kerala Chief Minister and Kerala is where the BJP is the weakest, a virtual persona non grata.
As for the Congress, it should have welcomed Modi’s decision to honour Tharoor by choosing him to lead an all-party delegation of terror-busters. Instead, the Congress chose to attack Tharoor with innuendos and made an enemy of Tharoor with untold consequences. Will Tharoor make a switch or will he choose not to press the button. The best advice: Tharoor should use his brain. (IPA Service)
