 "Why Tharoor's sacking as spokesman is a message to the party")
For all of Rahul Gandhi’s talk, the Congress party has just thrown all notions of democracy and fairness under the bus by sacking former Cabinet minister Shashi Tharoor as a party spokesperson, ostensibly because he praised Prime Minister’s Narendra Modi’s cleanliness campaign.
The political sycophancy and expediency that has likely led to this decision is symptomatic of what really ails the Congress party. So let’s look at why Tharoor may have been given the boot from his position, one that he admittedly had been neglecting over the past few months, but also one that he did rather well while he did it, always articulating the Congress’ liberal values in a manner that was well argued and cogent, standing up for the first family of Indian politics, and most important, doing it all without exploding into spittle-flecked apoplexy.
And yet, the minute he accepted a ‘viral challenge’ from Modi to participate in the Clean India Programme, saying he felt ‘honoured’ to be challenged, all hell broke loose.
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To be fair to Tharoor, it was an offer he could not refuse. To have done so would only have shown him – and by extension, the Congress party – in the worst possible light, as churlish leaders who can’t bring themselves to join the PM in a nation-building exercise. Worse, because it was a tactical masterpiece by Modi, saying no would have drawn instant criticism that the Congress wanted to keep Indians in filthy conditions for vote-bank politics.
As events have shown, the sacking of Tharoor has raised exactly the same question: Is Congress so opposed to a clean India that it fired its own spokesperson for lauding the Prime Minister’s initiative. In one fell swoop, the Congress has made it clear that political support or admiration for any opposition project – no matter how noble the idea is – has no place in the party. The move smacks of pettiness, petulance, and a severe poverty of genuinely liberal ideology.
It did not help matters that Tharoor had written an article under his own name in the Huffington Post wondering whether Modi as Prime Minister had indeed turned over a leaf from his authoritarian and Hindutva self into a genuinely moderate and inclusive leader, or as he called it, Modi 2.0. The Swachh Bharat comments were only the spark that lit the fire that cooked Tharoor’s goose. Of course, everyone has conveniently forgotten the many critical pieces he wrote for NDTV questioning Modi’s policies – and a handful giving credit to Modi where it was due.
But the fact is that the knives have been out for Tharoor, especially in Kerala, since the day he entered Indian politics. First, for his perceived closeness to the Gandhi family, and second, because he had not had to play any political games to reach where he did, he came unemcumbered of any political baggage which meant that he was under no obligation to do anyone any favours.
What’s worse is that Tharoor got the boot even after he explained his position on his Facebook page, not once but twice. Here’s what he said when the first article appeared:
“I am astonished that anyone would suggest that I am pro-BJP. I have a 30-year paper trail of published writings on my idea of India and my profound belief in India's pluralism. Being receptive to specific statements or actions of BJP leaders does not remotely imply acceptance of the party's core Hindutva agenda. The PM pitched his appeal as a non-political one and I received it in that spirit. I am a proud Congressman and a proud Indian. In short: not pro-BJP, just pro-India!”
When the attacks persisted, he reiterated his position in a longer post, in which he wrote the following:
“As a proud Congressman, who is grateful for the support of my fellow party workers, I see no reason for my party to surrender the noble objective of a Clean India to the BJP, especially when it has been a Congress objective for decades. Let us honour the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi, whether we agree with anything else the Prime Minister believes, or not.” (emphasis mine).
Unfortunately for Tharoor, calls for his action came at about the same time that a new report suggested that his wife Sunanda Pushkar had likely died of poisoning and not because of natural causes or even a medicinal overdose. This, his critics whisper, is why he had been speaking glowingly of Modi, insinuating that it was in the hope that the ruling government would protect him in case of an adverse finding in the cause of Pushkar’s death.
At another level, the Pushkar case was also rapidly becoming an image liability for Tharoor as well as the party. As one of the most high-profile Congress leaders in Parliament, not to mention one of the few that managed to withstand the Modi wave, any negative fallout from the investigation would have only provided more fodder for Gandhi family critics, even as the party was heading into crucial Assembly elections in Maharashtra, Haryana and possibly Jammu and Kashmir (if elections can be held there post-floods).
Tharoor is not the first Congressman to be sacrificed at the altar of political expediency and alleged ‘anti-party’ activities. Neither will he be the last. But his sacking is proof that not much has changed the party since its electoral drubbing. If anything, the loss has sent the party back to a mindset where protecting the Gandhis is paramount and where members, instead of speaking their minds, are only expected to be their masters’ voice.