Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Jan 24: The senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Saturday firmly refused to be drawn into any controversy over his skipping the key party meeting in Delhi on Friday while reiterating that at no stage he had violated the party’s positions on any issue in Parliament.
He also asserted that he remains “unapologetic” about his stances on national security, such as backing the BJP-led central government on its moves against Pakistan, including extending full support to “Operation Sindoor” on which his party had certain reservations.
Speaking at the Kerala Literature Festival, the four-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram made it clear that he would not use a public platform to air internal party and refused to be drawn into public speculation over his absence from the key Congress meeting in Delhi, stating that the issue has already been sufficiently discussed and that any concerns will be raised directly with the party leadership. “I am not here to make any political declarations. This is a literary festival. These are issues I need to take up with my own party leadership and not in a public forum,” Tharoor said.
While the Congress leadership maintained that Tharoor’s absence was due to prior commitments at the Kerala Literature Festival (KLF), media reports quoting sources claimed that he skipped the meeting because he had felt “deeply insulted” by a perceived snub by party leader Rahul Gandhi at a recent event in Kochi.
About his differences on political issues, Mr Tharoor said, “If you look at any of my public statements on record, I have at no stage violated any of the party’s positions in parliament.” “The only issue on which there has been a public disagreement on principle has been about Operation Sindoor where I did take a very strong stand.”
He added that he would be heading to Delhi for Parliament session where he expected opportunity for a proper and structured conversation with the party leadership. “I have been in Congress for the last 17 years. Whatever has gone wrong needs to be addressed, and it will be addressed in the appropriate forum,” he said. Tharoor underlined that he has already clarified his position on not attending the meeting and would not offer further public explanation. “The issue has been adequately covered by the media. Some reports may be right, some may not. I will not publicly clarify my reasons,” he said, stressing that the party leadership had been informed in advance about his unavailability.
He made the statements at the literature festival in Kozhikode during a session on his book on spiritual leader Sree Narayana Guru, after he was asked about his long-standing friction with the Congress leadership. He did not address specific instances, but said he stood by his writings and speeches on advocating a “kinetic response” against terrorist camps following the Pahalgam terror attack in Kashmir last year.
That response was Operation Sindoor. He said his recommendations for targeted strikes were eventually mirrored by the government’s actions. Tharoor invoked Jawaharlal Nehru’s famous question, “Who lives if India dies?” to argue that political differences must take a backseat on the country’s security issues. “When India is at stake… India comes first,” he asserted.
“I remain unapologetic because after Pahalgam incident I, as an observer and commentator had written in a column — the title I gave was After Pahalgam, but they changed it to Hit Hard, Hit Smart — this cannot go unpunished and we have to hit them,” he said.
“I also said we are a country focused on our development. We do not want to be dragged into a prolonged conflict with Pakistan, and investors don’t like war zones, so we can’t take a step that would turn India into a war zone. Therefore hit only a finite number of them terrorist targets, and signal very clearly that we Indians are only attacking terrorism, we are not attacking Pakistan. You can imagine my astonishment and joy, ten days later, when the Government in India did exactly what I recommended.”
Mr Tharoor said he supported Operation Sindoor throughout and afterwards. “When the Government sent me, along with many other leaders of many other parties, for some reason my party did not like my doing this, apparently, you can speak to them and find out why, but as I said publicly in response, and I will repeat again today, Jawaharlal Nehru’s very famous question, who lives if India dies?” he said.
“When India’s security is at stake, India comes first. Political parties are important, they are a vehicle to create a better India. We can disagree with each other on the ways to do that, but whenever India’s interests are involved, India prevails.”
His foreign policy stance has previously drawn sharp criticism from within the Congress for being at variance with the party line, which has sought to hold the BJP regime responsible for lapses in security and the manner in which a ceasefire was reached after Op Sindoor. In fact, the ceasefire has become an issue linked to trade tariffs imposed by the US on India, with Donald Trump repeatedly demanding credit for the truce even as India denies it acted on his cue.
Tharoor was also criticised by other party leaders for his stance on being part of the multi-party delegation on Operation Sindoor, which went to different countries to put forward India’s stance following the Pahalgam terror attack. Prominent leaders like Rahul Gandhi or Mallikarjun Kharge were not invited nor was the main Opposition party asked to name anyone from its side.
While Tharoor, who is also the working president of the Kerala unit, was in Kerala on Friday, the Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge had chaired a crucial brainstorming session at his residence in Delhi to fine-tune the strategy for the upcoming Kerala assembly election.
The meeting was attended by the party’s top brass, including Rahul Gandhi, general secretary KC Venugopal, and Kerala in-charge Deepa Dasmunshi, besides Sachin Pilot and K J George, plus state unit chief Sunny Joseph along with Ramesh Chennithala and V D Satheesan.
Despite an official explanation that Tharoor had “prior permission” to attend the literary festival, the party sources had claimed the root cause of his skipping the Delhi meet was the party event in Kochi on January 19. During that event, Rahul Gandhi reportedly acknowledged 12 senior leaders by name but not Tharoor, even though the MP was sitting in the same row on the dais. Sources close to Tharoor had said he had felt “sidelined” despite being one of the three Congress Working Committee (CWC) members from the state.
The internal friction particularly with Tharoor persists when Kerala is set for a potential triangular battle in the assembly polls expected by May 2026. The Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) is aiming to unseat the Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led LDF, which has held power for a decade.
The BJP-led NDA is also ramping up its campaign. On Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Thiruvananthapuram where he slammed both the LDF and UDF for “dangerous politics of appeasement”, effectively alleging the alliances have not been giving due attention to issues related to Hindus, and were responsible for “misgovernance.”
Notably, while Tharoor skipped the Delhi party meet, he did attend the Prime Minister’s official government event in Thiruvananthapuram where he flagged off some trains. So far, within the UDF, an understanding was reached that Tharoor would campaign statewide, but his “unapologetic” assertions and absence from the strategy table highlighted ongoing tensions within the state unit.
This was not the first time he has skipped a major party meeting, with at least three similar instances over the past few months. There was apparently a thaw when he spoke for the party in the Lok Sabha during the Vande Mataram discussion in December. But state-level differences, and ongoing friction, appear to have taken precedence for now.