May 29, 2025
NEW DELHI – The Congress is clearly miffed with senior party MP Shashi Tharoor over his statements in support of the Narendra Modi government post Operation Sindoor.
Tharoor, who is currently not in the good books of the party’s top leadership, praised India’s strikes on terror camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, in Panama, saying the BJP government conducted the first cross-border surgical strike.
Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera was quick to repudiate. He posted an old interview of former prime minister Manmohan Singh in which the latter said many surgical strikes were conducted under the UPA regime, but they were never publicized.
The Congress spokesperson also posted along with his tweet an interview given by Singh in this regard.
Tharoor is leading a multi-party delegation to five countries as part of India’s global anti-terrorism outreach under Operation Sindoor. The former Union minister was not among the Congress members whose names were sent by the party to the government for inclusion in multi-party delegations sent to different countries to expose Pakistan for its continued support to cross-border terrorism. However, the government ignored the party’s list and named Tharoor as the leader of one of the delegations, which is visiting the US and some other important nations.
Tharoor also highlighted India’s strong yet measured and calibrated response to the dastardly Pahalgam terror attack in which 26 people were killed, during a statement he made in New York on Saturday.
The top leadership is upset as there is a sense within the Congress that Tharoor is taking an entirely different position on the Modi government from that of the party post Operation Sindoor.
Tharoor also earned the ire of senior Congress leader Udit Raj who called him a “super BJP spokesperson” for praising the Modi government.
He claimed that the MP from Thiruvananthapuram is doing a better job of praising the PM than any BJP member.
In a post on X, Raj said, ”My dear @ShashiTharoor Alas! I could prevail upon PM Modi to declare you as the super spokesperson of BJP, even declaring as foreign minister before landing in India. How could you denigrate the golden history of Congress by saying that before PM Modi, India never crossed LoC and International border?”
BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla came to the defence of Tharoor and accused the Congress of hypocrisy. ”For Congress, anyone who puts India first, Desh Hit above Dal Hit and Parivar Hit, Is persona non grata. Now, Udit Raj, on instructions of Rahul Gandhi, is abusing Shashi Tharoor as Shashi busted Rahul’s lies on mediation & busted Pak narrative. Shameful,” he said.