Congress Party can be blamed for not having the best leadership at the central level thanks to Rahul Gandhi’s ‘able’ & ‘intellectual’ leadership but it does have some intelligent and learned individuals. These individuals, unfortunately, have to reason with the public and press to cover up and distract their minds from the goof-ups of Rahul Gandhi & his ‘efficient’ team. Member of Parliament from Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala since 2009 and a Congress party leader, Shashi Tharoor belongs to the latter group which does damage control for the Congress party and launches verbal attacks on the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA). The close contact Shashi Tharoor maintains with Rahul Gandhi seems to have transferred some of the ‘powers’ of Rahul Gandhi to Tharoor.
A well read and highly educated politician, Shashi Tharoor has authored several bestsellers while also writing columns which have appeared in many newspapers and magazines. His speeches are listened to and followed closely by the youngsters. It is sad when such a personality has to stoop down and indulge in the ordinary blame game politics of the Congress Party.
Shashi Tharoor while speaking to reporters at the Raipur airport on Wednesday accused the BJP of engineering a proxy disruption during the budget session which ended in April. He tried to clarify the position of the Congress Party leaders by saying, “The allegations are baseless. Congress members remained seated and never trooped into the well.”
He conveniently forgot to mention that it was the Congress Party members who had led to the session being suspended on the 5th of March, when they raised slogans against the government for its failure to reign in scams in public sector banks and to bring the scamsters back. These frauds have roots in the Congress Party rule at the Centre and possibly the reason why the Congress party members did not want the BJP government to give a reply on this topic. Afraid of being exposed, the Congress MPs did not let the BJP leaders give a proper reply.
Similar activities happened all throughout the Budget session, with Telugu Desham Party (TDP) disrupting the parliament over its demand for granting special status to Andhra Pradesh. TDP is an ex-NDA ally, looking to form an alliance with anti-BJP players for the upcoming 2019 elections.
The AIADMK’s inclusion in Tharoor’s statement is the most baffling. The question is how the NDA could use AIADMK in disrupting the Parliament when there is no love lost between the two given the Cauvery river dispute issue. NDA and AIADMK cannot look eye to eye on the issue so the allegation by Shashi Tharoor that NDA ‘collaborated’ with AIADMK on disrupting the Budget session is absurd.
The wise and learned Shashi Tharoor forgot the useless and double faced protests organized by the Congress MPs on the proposed changes by the Supreme Court on the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
We agree on the fact that Mr. Tharoor has a way with words, and it might be very difficult to challenge him for a debate. But facts remain facts, and instead of accusing the NDA leaders of engaging in proxy disruption, Shashi Tharoor should have urged the opposition leaders to maintain calm while the session was underway. He could also have asked the opposition to apologize for the disruption during the Budget session. He instead chose to challenge the government over something which they are not guilty of. These baseless allegations of proxy disruption and mindless blame-game do not behoove an eminent writer such as Shashi Tharoor.