Amid speculations about Congress MP Shashi Tharoor’s growing affinity with the ruling BJP, senior party leader K Muraleedharan said that the veteran politician is not one of them anymore and won’t be invited to any party programmes in Thiruvananthapuram.
This comes amid Tharoor’s support for the way the government dealt with the Pahalgam attack, Operation Sindoor and the subsequent military action against Pakistan.
Muraleedharan said that Tharoor, a member of the Congress Working Committee (CWC), was no longer considered “one of us” and would remain excluded until he changed his stance on the national security issue.
“Till he (Tharoor) changes his stance, we will not invite him to any party programme held in Thiruvananthapuram. He is not with us, so there is no question of him boycotting an event,” said K Muraleedharan about his party colleague Shashi Tharoor.
His response also comes a day after Tharoor had said that the nation comes first and parties are the means of making the country better.
“Which is your first loyalty? To my mind, the nation comes first. Parties are a means of making the nation better. So, to my mind, whichever party you belong to, the objective of the party is to create a better India in its own way,” said the Congress MP at an event in Kochi on Saturday.
ALSO READ: Assam BJP charts 2026 poll strategy in two-day closed-door meet
Tharoor had earlier acknowledged that he had received a lot of criticism over his stand supporting the government over the issue of national security.
He was also part of the all-party delegations sent to various countries for an outreach after ‘Operation Sindoor’.
