After his act of joining the Swachchh Bharat Abhiyan of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday despite his party’s recent disciplinary action against him, a strong section in Kerala’s Congress wants the party to stop worrying too much about the acts and stands of MP Shashi Tharoor.
According to this section, the party must simply neglect any controversial act or statement Tharoor makes in the future. They are of the feeling that Tharoor has perhaps decided not to keep a peaceful relationship with the party leadership or to abide by the decisions it takes on crucial issues.
The Congress High Command had on October 13 removed Tharoor as the party's spokesman on the basis of a complaint from the State leadership over his acceptance of Modi’s invitation to join the Swachchh Bharat Abhiyan and the tendency he had allegedly been showing of late to praise the BJP and the Prime Minister.
“The only possible explanation for his act (of launching of his own a cleanliness drive in his constituency on Saturday) is that he does not perhaps understand the message behind the disciplinary action taken against him. If he had, he would have discussed with the leadership before organizing such an event,” said a senior Congress leader.
Technically, the leadership cannot find fault with Tharoor over his Saturday programme at Vizhinjam in Thiruvananthapuram constituency as he had made it clear that it had nothing to do with Modi’s Clean India Mission. But the programme also indicated that he was prepared to defy the leadership’s orders, feel certain Congress leaders.
While State Congress president VM Sudheeran reacted to Tharoor’s programme with a statement that Swachh Bharat would not happen just because somebody wielded a broom before TV cameras, former PCC chief K Muraleedharan MlA said that Tharoor was immature in many of his acts and the people were suspicious of the positions he was taking.
Tharoor thanks Modi
Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Sunday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi via Twitter for taking up the Swachchh Bharat Abhiyan. Modi had appreciated Tharoor’s joining the Clean India campaign by launching a waste-removal programme at Vizhinjam in his Thiruvananthapuram constituency on Saturday.
“Thank you @narendramodi ji. Here’s a video of my clean up & a request to you,” Tharoor said in the tweet in response to Modi’s Twitter message.
In the video on his clean-up programme in Vizhinjam which he attached to the tweet, Tharoor sought assistance from the Prime Minister for cleaning up the filth-filled Parvathy Puthanar canal in Thiruvananthapuram.
Tharoor’s message of gratitude and request to the Prime Minister came amidst criticisms from Congress leaders against him for joining the Swachchh Bharat campaign.