Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday said he has “differences of opinion” with some in the party leadership, a re- mark that could lead to an- other round of turbulence in the grand old party. Breaking his silence over his absence from campaigning in the Nilambur bypolls in his home state Kerala, he further said he did not receive any invitation or missed call from the state leaders.
Speaking to reporters here, Tharoor, who is also the Congress Working Committee (CWC) mem- ber said: “I wasn’t invited by the party. But that’s al- right.” He made the remarks when asked about his ab- sence from the campaign trail in Nilambur where voting for the by election is under way. “First of all, I was gone for much of the time on this official diplomatic mission. When I came back there was no insistence, no missed call from the leader- ship saying I should come,” he said.
Tharoor also admitted of having differences with some party leaders and said, “I do have differences of opinion with some in the Congress leadership.”
The Congress leader also added that you (media) know what I am talking about, as some of those is- sues are there in the public domain and have been re- ported. He, however, didn’t divulge whether the dis- agreement was with the state or central leadership.
Tharoor also stressed on the importance of internal dialogue over public discourse and said, “I have been working in Congress for the past 16 years. I have some differences of opinion with the party, and I will discuss them inside the party… Today I don’t want to speak on it. I need to meet and talk, let the time come, and I will discuss it.”
Tharoor also urged the people to vote for Congress candidate Aryadan Shoukath and dubbed him as a good candidate. He also said that party leaders and workers had worked a lot in the bypolls in Nilambur. His remarks came in the wake of criticism from his own party members when he had led an all-party delegation to five countries as part of global outreach programme to expose Pakistan on global platform and ex- plain India’s point in wake of Pahalgam terror attack and India carrying out Operation Sindoor.
Tharoor was also corrected by his own party leader after he said that India carried out surgical strikes for the first time after 2014.
