Earlier today in my Google News feed, I was surprised to note a story in the Indian news about Shashi Tharoor’s campaign for a Lok Sabha seat in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala. Tharoor, whom we’ve written about relatively often at Sepia Mutiny, was until 2007 the Under-Secretary General of the United Nations. He is currently 53, which makes him practically a baby in Indian Political Years; he could certainly have a significant political career ahead of him in India if things work out. The nation-wide Parliamentary elections start in India next month.
Tharoor is running as a Congress Party/UPA member. He has started a bilingual website to articulate his campaign platform. Here is his recent announcement at the Huffington Post, explaining roughly what he’s trying to do:
On Thursday night, 19 March 2009, the Indian National Congress party announced my nomination as its candidate for the Lok Sabha (the Lower House of Parliament) at the forthcoming General Elections. I will contest from the capital of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram (known more familiarly as Trivandrum).
It’s a huge turn in my life and involves a further “reboot” two years after leaving the UN. The seat is currently held by the Communist Party of India, which has nominated its general secretary. There are also candidates from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), a former Congress Member of Parliament, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), as well an independent candidate who has already outspent the rest of us and whose posters have been plastered across the city. Rumours are circulating of a sixth possible entrant into the fray. Psephologists would have about as much accuracy as astrologers in predicting the outcome of such a complex contest.
Thiruvananthapuram is only about 40% urban Рthe rest of the constituency, stretching to the southernmost tip of the country, is rural, and includes a large coastal community dependent largely upon fishing. As I embark on this voyage, every clich̩ about sailing into uncharted waters and choppy seas applies to me. (link)
I wish Tharoor all the best, though I have no idea what the local political issues might be that would affect his chances against an established Communist MP in this race. (Is Communist Party support in Thiruvanananthapuram effectively permanent?) Given Tharoor’s international stature, it’s hard to imagine this is anything other than a stepping-stone to a high level post in the next UPA government (if there is one, and if he wins). Obviously not Prime Minister (too soon for that); perhaps something else?
As a side note, Tharoor has recently been accused by environmentalists of being too cozy with the Coca Cola corporation, as he serves on the advisory board of the Yatn Foundation, a philanthropic organization funded by Coke. The letter criticizing him is “An Open Letter to Shashi Tharoor”. Tharoor’s response to the criticisms is here. Any comments on the Coke plant/water issues at issue here? I don’t know much about it (Tharoor’s defense of both his involvement and the Coca Cola Corporation seem persuasive to me on first glance.)
I have to say I really dislike Shashi Tharoor and his middle-of-the-road liberalism. Which is strange since I am in agreement with him on so many issues; I guess it is his liberal unwillingness to ever make hard choices and his almost Blairite cosying up to those who happen to be in power that irks me. Comes from the right direction, but will never have the balls to back up his (relatively mild but progressive) beliefs.
I am probably being too harsh on the guy but then I am bit of a bastard.
The Thiruvananthapuram seat is a funny one, it used to go to someone from the Nadar community (both LDF/UDF), because they are a very solid bloc in rural Tvm, where most of the voting people are. Recently though, the trend has changed, and the parties have tried to appeal to the Nairs in the urban part. The BJP has a very strong presence in Tvm, even harboring hopes of winning this time, given the four-way split (LDF/BSP/BJP/Cong) of votes.
Tharoor has a winning chance, because he is cleaner then the rest of the crowd, and there is a general anti-incumbent mood. He may also appeal to the younger voters (and women, speculate Kerala papers). But things can get really ugly, particularly on the caste side, and he may actually have to advertise his Nairness. Congress doesn’t have much of a party machinery, and there is an influential Congress rebel, who owns their TV channel. So his money may take away the party workers.
Can’t help but think that this will be another close-second finish for Tharoor.
Still, it would be great to see someone with his abilities taking on the Foreign Ministry portfolio in an Indian government.
btw isn’t Tharoor from Palakkad?
I think SM should cover an upcoming party started with good values named loksatta.
It is started by a physician turned IAS officer. He quit the babudom and entered politics a decade ago. He will be contesting for lok sabha this april. You can read his interview here.
1 · Conrad Barwa said
except when it comes to saris and cricket.
Tharoor had this planned for a while and is one of the luckier ones insofar getting a plum seat is concerned. I agree with Conrad with regard to his watered down ‘progressive’ politics which I guess went down well with his UN job although he emerged a stronger critic of US foreign policy after he left his job. His felicity with Malayalam is nothing much to write home about, something that he acknowledged in a recent TV interview. As for a possible FM position, he will be lucky if he gets a MOS.
So true. While he has been careful about going around wearing mundu (loin cloth) which is a pre-condition for acceptance as a Keralite politician, he spoils the effect by adding a stole, which is no longer a part of common Malayali attire. Not to mention his North Indian style Kurtas in color. His dandy looks might actually put off some.
8 · sartoriallychallenged said
I hope he grows a mustache, at the very least.
As he recently said in an interview, an MP has to be effective in representing his people at Delhi where making speeches in mellifluous Malyalam will not work. In the last election, the LDF won 19 out of 20 seats in Kerala. Most polls and analyists (and we must take this with a pinch of salt) are predicting a complete reversal this year. Tharoor might get lucky and ride the wave.He’s been lobbying for this seat for a while. It’s actually admirable that he is going the Lok Sabha route, I am assuming he would have gotten into the Rajya Sabha (the nominated upper house of parliament) very easily
As for the External Affairs Ministry. If the Congress comes to power and there is an opening in the big four (Defence, Home, Finance and External Affairs) since Shivraj Patil is out of the running. My bet is that Pranab Mukherjee is moved to home, and Shashi Tharoor gets the foreign office. First time cabinet ministers are not without precedent. After all Manmohan Singh was an unelected bureaucrat heading the Planning Commission when he was appointed Finance Minister in 1991, Tharoor atleast would have contested a Lok Sabha election
6 · plummy pol said
Ok, wow; I don’t actually read much of what Tharoor writes anymore so didn’t know about those articles. They are kind of silly really; I think the one about cricket is just incredibly stupid, I don’t like cricket or baseball but I wouldn’t trash either so easily and a good case can be made for the latter representing many of the virtues that Tharoor claims to find in cricket. And in anycase, I think he as usual underestimates just how strong some of the social similarities between us and the US are; modern cricket is moving away from the era of 5-day test cricket and now we have the razzmatazz of 20-20 completele with the accompanying showmanship and cheerleaders as well as big money. Tharoor seems to be stuck in a time-warp if he can’t see the shift towards shorter, more focused and entertainment driven sport in the cricketing world; in thise sense baseball has not changed as much from its original format (based on my limited knowledge here of the sport). I will confess I too have a preference for saris and note its decline with some regret but I am not stupid enough to pen a whiny article about it since: I am a man not a woman, don’t actually wear inconvenient dresses like saris and don’t have to put up with being ogled at when if I would. Obviously, if like Tharoor one is a man who enjoys (for whatever reason) seeing women wearing saris, that is fine but it is incredibly unaware and insensitive to think that this might not be the best platform off which to lecture women who actually have to wear them to do so. How Tharoor could get away with writing that is beyond me. I am not even going to go into that rather bizarre comment he made about “Punjabi masculine names†except to say that he might have had a few too many G&Ts when he came out with that little scorcher.
On the Coke issue that Amardeep mentioned towards the end; I don’t find Tharoor’s position convincing in the least. I am not familiar with the details of the Kerala case but groundwater depletion is an independent problem from any industrial use, since oexcessive use by farming dependent on HYV seed yields and the lack of user charging is the major problem. But I fail to see how MNCs like Coke maurauding around the countryiside extracting 500,000 litres per day is going to help the issue. Also my understanding was that the Supreme Court has overuled the Kerala HC ban in Plachimada anyway. Here is a counterview to Tharoor’s article from an environmentalist:
http://www.thehindu.com/2009/03/06/stories/2009030661851400.htm
In my view, the main problem with the case was the way that water has now come to be regarded as a commodity instead of the common property resource and how local communities are by-passed in having local water resources sold off to external agents. I don’t think this is a viable long-term approach for a country like India which will face serious resource constraints in the near future. And Tharoor’s faith in CSR is really touching; one of the main criticisms of the UN Global Compact was that it was bascially negotiated bilaterally with the MNCs and the UN and that like so much of CSR it is pretty much voluntary without any enforcement mechanism in place. I don’t think anyone today will perhaps be as trusting of how much we can rely on private corporate institutions to police themselves, as Tharoor clearly is. I also don’t know where ST got those figures about employment from the coke factory from and am a little bit sceptical as to them and the general model he proposes for employment creation based on investment by companies like Coke. Like the recent SEZ fiasco where all these promised jobs failed to materialise in many cases; one of the recurring problem in India post-liberalisation has been the weakness of job-creation particularly in the private industrial sector: this has many facets but in the wake of no labour legislation reform, appropriate labour intensive investment and improvement in the human capital of workers, it is unlikely to improve no matter how much companies like Coke invest.
I think Satish has it right, that he would be lcuky to get an MoS position, never mind Foreign Minister. Yes, first time Cabinet Mnisters are not unknown in India but those that have been so have either come from political dynastic families or have been able to win elections of their own name for the party on the ground rather than relying on the party name/machinery to win it for them. ST falls in neither camp, so I doubt he will get such a senior position straight away. In anycase, it will be a coalition govt at the centre again so invariably there will need to be cabinet positions doled out to coalition partners to keep them happy and the big chairs will have to be reserved either for Congress politicos who can keep the coalition in line or to please troublesome allies. Even though in India, the PM makes foreign policy not the FM, this is true of the MEA. Handing the latter to a novice like ST would be disastrous imo; the MEA bureacracy is one of the wort and most intractable, without some knowledge of how to manipulate and dominate the bureacracy it would be a difficult first assignment. Experienced hands like IK Gujral had some difficulty in getting policy changes through, I don’t what success ST will have.
However, in the Congress party anything is possible; since it still has what many would derisively call the “Congress culture” of sycophancy instilled in it; so rational decisions are not always its forte. I have to say that one of the problems with Indian democracy are the degenerating state of its main parties esepcially the Congress, and to a lesser extent the BJP. Without revitalising or reforming them; there will be a negative impact on politics at the national level; as it is only the smaller regional/caste-based parties that seem to show much signs of life on the ground. ST actually wrote a good article on this, way back in the 1970s when he attacked the Emergency; though he avoided putting too much blame on Indira Gandhi and the rapid institutional decay of the Congress that was occurring even then. The situation is much worse now and the party simply doesn’t exist in many parts of the country on the ground where it used to be a big presence. All that seems to be holding it together is self-interest and a toadying relationship with what is left of the Family. I am not sure how Tharoor, who still seems to be stuck in a 1950s Nehruvian mindset on political matters (his economic (neo)liberalism is the exception) will be able to change things or fit in.
Conrad, Tharoor Nardar, Splinterlong, thanks for your insights
Tharoor has done his part. Remember this article he wrote?
I am surprised to hear this. Given the Kerala’s dependance on expatriates, and given the large nnumber of them who are returning now, I would have thought that Shashi Tharoor would be immune to the Carpet Bagger charge.
Given his Nehruvian mindset This is probably a good thing in Tharoor’s case 🙂 Also, the damage Tharoor did to India’s image as a influential asian power, when he ran for Sec Gen’s position on a pure ego trip, I doubt if he has any friends in MEA.
(I never was a fan of MEA, but hearning that they delayed IK Gujral’s disastrous policies gives me a new found respect for them.)
Oh my. Why in the world would he join Kangress?
A little late in the day to grow a ‘meesha’! But he has already ditched his fancy kurtas and stoles for the Mallu Congressmen’s uniform -white ‘khader’ shirt and mundu. And his Malayalam is remarkably good for someone who has never lived in the state. I, for one, feel more favourably disposed towards him now seeing how fluent and comfortable he is speaking the language.
As many of you have noted, there is a strong anti-incumbency wave in the state favouring the Congress right now and if they are able to subtly play up his ‘Nairness’ without coming out as overtly communal he can win. His position on the Coke issue in North Kerala won’t matter to the Southern Kerala voters, except for the leftists, who anyway would not have voted for him. As most mainstream Keralite politician’s pose as ‘relatively mild, but progressive’, his policy positions won’t significantly affect his chances either.
I was referring more to the MEA set up and the institutional set-up of the IFS which has created problems for the Foreign Minsiters in the past; with Foreign Secretaries frequnetly going over their heads to the PM (as happened with JN Dixit) and certain national security concerns that cropped up when Prabnab Mukgherjee was Foreign Minister. For a number of reasons it is a Ministry that resist change and is not easy to reform or change direction of policy comparied to other central ministries; I have a few IAS officers in my famiyl who periodically complain that the IFS should be disbanded and reformed, which is a drastic solution but some sort of change would be desirable here imo.
On the ST’s eletability and the Coke issue; of course it will be voters in his local constituency that will decide matters in the end; but South Kerala doesn’t inhabit a different planet from north Kerala, they are as far as I know part of the same eco-system so environmental issues and how they are tackled is an important public policy topic which all politicians will have to address. The phenonmenon of water scarcity and soil fertility is a great concern to farming communities everywhere, no matter which part of India you are talking about. I don’t know how these issues will play out in ST’s constituency but it is important. And of course my comment about his ‘mild but progressive’ politics was really a judgement about the desirability of his cadidacy and his potential worth as an elected leader not about whether he would win. Clearly as a represenative from Kerala this a matter for Keralite voters; but since he is being elected to the Lok Sabha and not the vidhan sabha, and will affect national policy if he assumes a ministerial position this is a matter of interest for all Indians outside the state as well. I have a considerable degree of faith in our electorate; they have become increasingly discerning over the years and can vote one party in at a state election and vote for another party in a national election. The Kerala electorate is one of the most sophisticated in this regard so they will make an informed choice. It will be interesting to see the result.
Good point – maybe his short stint in Dubai will add some cred. Still, he wasn’t the typical Malayali expat. Maybe the people will rally around the whole UN thing and from the comments, I see that his spoken Malayalam (a bigger issue IMO) is passable.
Shashi Tharoor a few months back started a finishing school (to teach English communication skills) in the Thiruvananthapuram Technopoark, so his Mallu claims, it’s not all empty talk………
In the highly political state of Kerala, it is the narrow slice of independents in the middle that decide elections. While individual charms and creds do matter some, it is anti-incumbency feelings against the party holding power in the state that are the strongest, and often results in a complete rout, based on the last few elections.
For Parliamentary elections, in particular, I feel people vote moslty based on state issues, for the primary reason illustrated by this campaign poster (paraphrased) that appeared a few years back “To strengthen Sonia Gandhi’s hands, vote for the UDF (Congress) or the LDF (Communist)”!!! Well, with talks of a third front this election, not sure whether the equation changes.
I’ve been waiting/expecting Shashi Tharoor to get into Indian politics with hopeful anticipation. I confess I am definitely disappointed, but not surprised, that he joined the Congress/UPA government, but what the hell.
I can see Tharoor as an excellent External Affairs Minister…but not really as CM of Kerala.
And the Congress Party…ugh. Long live the sycophants indeed.
Re KeralaCoke plant issues, although this was taken in Chennai and Sharad Haksar himselfdefended as an irony, I think he said it best. IMO, P. Sainath is best at articulating a strong position on the villainy of those who would further privatize water use, and CounterPunch has also published many of his articles referencingreportto Coke in Kerala and elsewhere in India.
Apologies for posting twice, SMIntern– my typing really sucks today.
Can someone please explain all these acronyms to me?
Alternatively, my gratitude goes out to anyone who can explain basic Indian politics in one paragraph. Assume I am an idiot, which I also happen to be.
22 · embarrassed said
Bastards, crooks, liars, and scoundrels.
23 · Yoga Fire said
And a few scalawags here and there.
24 · Yoga Fire said
Scalawags–Yoga fire you see had a starring role in Gone with the Wind
22 · embarrassed said
Indian politics follows a parliamentary system with a first past the post electoral system. There are multiple candidates, so it is more useful to have very loyal blocks of constituencies, rather than have a broad support across the spectrum. Leaders of these blocks often change parties based on the current opportunity. The congress due to legacy factors has a thin cross country presence, the BJP, due to the RSS support has similar cross country presence (although it has very little presence in some states). Other parties have specific regional presences. Political Parties run by a small leadership set the voting record and agenda for all representatives. The individual representative has no power to influence legislation or policy. There is no filibuster system / power sharing system, etc, so an opposition party has no power at all. Since winning power now becomes of paramount importance, alliances are made on the basis of which blocks of communities will get more votes than other blocks, So governments have no specific ideology (with the exception of probably the communists, and to a smaller extent the BJP)
Acronyms: MEA — Ministry of External Affairs also referred to as South Block PM- Prime minister UPA – the current ruling coalition (don’t want to start a flame war, so I am not writing what I think the Acronym should be) Congress BJP, etc — Various political parties
Shashi Tharoor has probably bitten off more than whan he can chew. He is perhaps not an ordinary resident of India as defined by the section 20 of Representation of People’s Act. A blogger raised the issue: his office has not replied. see here for the post:(in malayalam, but comments are mostly in english) http://kantakasani.blogspot.com/2009/03/blog-post_18.html#comments There is anews item: http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=Much+ado+about+Tharoor&artid=CfqEPkDqPCo%3d&SectionID=1ZkF%2fjmWuSA%3d&MainSectionID=1ZkF%2fjmWuSA%3d&SEO=New+York&SectionName=X7s7i|xOZ5Y%3d
Shashi Tharoor is a pompous ass. It would be interesting to see how long he lasts in the rough and tumble world of Indian politics
Thiruvanandapuram parliament contest is going to be interesting..
http://www.mallutalk.com/bmallu/belection2009/candidates.jsp?constituency=1
It is also interesting that Conrad Barwa is Paul.
30 · my_dog_jagat said
I don’t even know who “Paul” is meant to be here but this is hardly the case.
Dont tell me these things 1. that Shashi Tharoor is a Nair. It does not matter in Thiruvananthapuram, as long as he is sure to leave the city the moment he gets elected, and never return, as he does not need this seat next time…Nair or not, this is unacceptable 2. that he can be a great diplomat, the talk about MEA or MOS. Nonsense, Of late, I am yet to meet a diplomat who is not a pimp…negotiating, bargaining, selling, sweet talking, partying, writing superficial columns…and now attempting to fool 10 lakh voters. 3. that he loves the nation and its people…yes ! he speaks so much about it, but just look at his eyes…and you will see he loves only himself…selfishy. the parliament seat we give him will just be another feather on his cap, to taunt around with all those ‘saris..’ 4. and his love for coke…what else can he do…if he had some sense of what kerala is, he would have realised that Kerala cannot with its limited land, industrialise as he thinks it can. factories like coke are an exploitative option in kerala…and we are in no mood to listen to another lecture from him on the virtues of coca cola foundation. He can lick their bum, if he wants, but leave us alone, our toungues have better tasks to do…
Sorry, he is not our choice…
Industrialisation works best, and is even necessary, only in places with limited land. That’s why small countries like Britain, Japan, Scandinavian countries etc (within India Haryana, Punjab etc) industrialised so heavily. Indeed, in places with abundance of land, agriculture can carry the place forward, so industrialisation is not too critical.
That, I agree with…
M. Nam
Industrialisation works best, and is even necessary, only in places with limited land.
I meant that there is choices / or limits to choice of industries. we cannot have resource exploitative ones…
Sorry, he is not our choice
That, I agree with…
Thanks for that…Hope a lakh voters agree…
For anyone who’s curious, here’s Shashi Tharoor speaking about his Malayalam in Malayalam.
It’s obvious in his accent that he grew up outside of Kerala. He has to use English to explain complex topics, but it’s not too bad. I’ve known people in Kerala, who went to school in Ooty, who speak like that.
I stand corrected – he can express himself quite fluently and at a pretty decent level. Sounds a bit like an Anglo-Indian malayalee 🙂
1) In one of his article he said, he saw Ganapathy drinking milk!
http://www.shashitharoor.com/articles/folklore.htm
“The lady of the house took us to her little shrine, an unremarkable pujaroom like so many in Hindu homes around the world. She had a number of statues and portraits, but only one was drinking milk: a tiny terracotta statue of Ganesh, no more than two and a half inches high. My Sikh friend, with trembling hand, extended her spoon towards the miniature trunk of the statue and we both watched the milk disappear into the little Ganesh. It was now my turn; with callous incompetence I held the spoon firm and level and the milk held steady. “Tilt it a bit,” our hostess urged, and when I did the milk duly disappeared into the statue. It was not as if I had poured the milk out, because then it would have flowed differently; nor was the milk simply spilled, though a couple of drops fell to the floor. Instead there seemed to be a gentle drawing out of the milk by an unknown force, perhaps capillary action. (Om capillary actioneyeh namaha?) The statue, we were told, had been “fed” some 180 times a day for eight days; surely its capillary channels and overall absorptive capacity would have been exhausted by now? As we stood mulling these thoughts, a young Indian woman in T-shirt and jeans, evidently part of the new generation of subcontinental Americans, came to take her turn before the statue. Ganesh drank willingly from her extended spoon.”
2) His article in Israel’s daily Haaretz says the Palestinians who lost their land home and sent to refugee camps permanently because of continuous invasion of Israel since 1947, are equivalant to Terrorists operating in India. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1057981.html
Agreed, Tharoor is quite fluent in Malayalam. Funny how he mangles some of the terms and ends up with interesting alternative meanings. Some choice examples –
(caveat, me no Sanskrit expert 🙂
For ‘Janadhipatyam’ (democracy) he says ‘Jatipatyam’ (casteism?) For ‘Vidyabhyaasam’ (exercise of learning) he says ‘Vidyabhaasam’ (vulgarity of learning?)
hmmm… the contest is getting juicier by the day…
Ernakulam (Kochi) district court has issued summons to Tharoor on a Public Interest petition. He is accused of obstructing the singing of the National Anthem, an offence that carries a penalty of upto 3 years of imprisonment. He seems to have interrupted the singing of Jana Gana Mana, at a function where he gave the keynote address, to ask the audience to put their hand on heart with pride the American way, as the Indian way of standing humble is a colonial legacy!
38 · Sartoriallychallenged said
For ‘Vellam’ (water), he says ‘Vallam’ (boat), though that doesn’t really create an interesting meaning as much as it is something NRI kids get mocked for.
I think it is being unfair to accuse Shashi Tharoor of not speaking Malayalam fluently or for mispronouncing certain words. I had the opportunity of hearing him speak on quite a number of occassions during the past two weeks and I have never heard him mispronounce the abovesaid words. As far as his fluency is concerned he is as fluent in the language as the average Malayali. His audiences do not seem to have any difficulty with his Malayalam. In fact, they are pleasantly surprised that the facts are contrary to what is being projected about him as a bad speaker in Malayalam.
Joseph
Does anyone know how he pronounces, Kundi?
I was pleasantly surprised at his fluency too. But please listen to the talk linked by Lea @ 35 and hear for yourself how he pronounces the above said words.
Well Tharoor says it is not possible to serve the country without becoming a MP or even better a Minister…if that is true, pray God pls help your own place on earth !!! Let us see if he continues to stay and what work after losing elections !! His histry is not particularly encouring, becaming a resident of Dubai (instead of India) and registering Afras Ventures there to do business in india is purely to evade taxes. So why should we taxpayers foot his cushy retirement in India as MP or even minister ? Being a proud Malyalee ??? Then why berates Indian culture and ape Americans ?? But give it to him man….he walks the talk…..living in America / Europe almost all his life with plans (in his own words last year) to live in India out of a suitcase….worked for americans in a job at UN for last 30 years….changed his Indian wife for an American……
And now of couse his big mission is to join Indian politics to clean us Indians up and teach us the American way of doing things….he says he will do service to people of Trivandrum by explaing their problems in English in Parliment…yes !!! maybe his british accent will help !! Just as he said in 2001 that he needed the UN job to pay for his Manhattan aptmt…poor guy !! now aging and close to retirement, he needs a cushy political job to keep his Coke company PR and free travel and housing perks so that he can holiday with his American wife and run his business in Dubai…..Yeaaa…and to top it all he does look yummyyy despite be close to 60. Does it matter if I can hardly understand what he says in his deep rumbing clipped english accent. will it make a difference if he talks in Malyalam ? hardly. JAI HO.
That is not fair to Shashi Tharoor. Tharoor’s paymasters are Arabs from Dubai, so it makes sense to have it registered in Dubai. As a businessman, his primary responsibility is to the company, so he has a duty to reduce the amount of taxes paid.
It is a fair question if they are paying him for his influence or for his work, given how little he has accomplished in all the time he has been the CEO and how mush time he spent on other activities. But for that we need more information, and I do not know if the EC disclosures go into this depth, or if any Indian media outlet analyzes the information provided to the EC through the Right to Information Act (You have to pay GOI for the cost of retrieving the information and frankly, I think the India media is too lazy/corrupt/incompetent to do unglamorous nitty gritty work on a regular basis.)
It is quite interesting that he had the guts to own all that he wrote about Indira and Sonia
belated thanks to DizzyDesi
I think that Sashi Tharoor is the best candidate that Thiruvananthapuram could ever get. I am really fed up with professional politions, who are in politics because they couldnt get anything else. Talk of being ruled by the rabble. Sashi Tharoor is an accomplished person in many fields. I will try to convince at least 20 to 100 people to vote for him. Only the Congress had the guts to bring in a person like Tharoor and thrust him down the gullets of the wannabe local goons. Some people seem to prefer the college dropouts and the public property saboteurs, its a free country to each his own.
I’m on the fence about him. On one hand he strikes me as a sickeningly annoying liberal with coconut-like tendencies. On the other, he could probably do a lot better for Kerala than those Commie goons have all these years.
I agree with Gauri. And for the fellows on the fence. Your vote should go to those who would be here in Trivandrum, even if he is a thug, rather than some one like Sashi who has to satisfy his NRI status – that is be outside Indian for 182 days. his status forces him to stay in US for half the year and then reside in Dubai and be an MP in Trivandrum ??
Moreover, I think he comes out as a very slimy smooth character for me. I would go for some one who is more simple, straight and local. after all we are not electing a UN rep we are only electing some one to represent our constituency, some one who can talk about our problems and no global problems. Sashi Tharoor is absolutely ignorant of the way we are and our problems.
Lets not be in a dream state. lets be realsitic.