Congress leader Shashi Tharoor is now embroiled in another controversy after he went to the Kashmir region and got criticism from party members in the valley.
Tharoor has met with Lieutenant Governor of the state Manoj Sinha, along with other dignitaries of Jammu and Kashmir, at his visit to Srinagar in order to attend the Nalanda Dialogues event, and later shared the interaction on social media. Speaking in his post, the Congress MP expressed his hope for positive negotiations over the region’s situation and what he described as “encouraging progress towards normalcy.”
Tharoor said that he was grateful to the Lieutenant Governor for his efforts to reach out to local organizations and also for his announcement that the problems were still there, but he did come out of the meeting with a positive outlook on developments in the region.
But, his say was not well received by the Congress’ Kashmir wing. It was a source of disappointment by party leaders that congress was not able to meet local Congress workers neither had Tharoor touched any common people during his visit.
In a public statement, Jammu and Kashmir PCC spokesperson Ravinder Sharma raised a question about Tharoor’s decision, saying that lots of people in Kashmir had hoped that he knows the local ground realities if he talks to people of Kashmir and party members there. Sharma added that Congress people were also campaigning for a separate statehood and were left out of the visit by the central government.
The incident has frayed the existing tensions in the Congress and split opinion on critical political issues and the way to propagate its reach to the region. Shashi Tharoor’s remarks were largely positive with regard to Kashmir, but the fact that the visit did not give the opportunity to meet with the workers and residents at the grassroots at first-hand has worried local party leaders.
The heated debate has reverted to one of the public dissension in Congress among members regarding political messaging and policy.