Amid reports of a rift between Sashi Tharoor and the Congress leadership, the Thiruvananthapuram MP has issued a clear warning to his party, saying if the party no longer values his contributions, he has other options available.

Speaking to the Indian Express in a Malayalam language podcast interview,Tharoor said he was available for the party if needed. “If the party wants to use that, I will be there for the party. If not, I have my own things to do. You should not think that I have no other option. I have my books, speeches, invitations from across the world to give a talk,” Tharoor said.

Advertisement

He said the Congress must look beyond its committed voter base for the 2026 Kerala assembly elections. “If they fail to do that, the party would find itself in the opposition for a third consecutive term,” Tharoor warned.

Stating that the Congress needed to draw people from beyond its committed voter base, Tharoor said the support he personally got in Thiruvananthapuram was an example. “My appeal in Thiruvananthapuram is much more than what the party enjoys. People like the way I talk and behave. Even those who are generally against the Congress voted for me. That’s what we want in 2026,” he said.

“Both at the national and the state level, the Congress cannot win only with its committed vote base. It’s a reality. If you look at the national level, the Congress vote was around 19%. Would we be fine with our own vote base? Only if we get 26-27% additional can we come to power. So, we need those who have not backed us in the last two elections,” Tharoor said.

On the controversy over his remarks praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s US visit and his article praising the industry policy of the LDF government in Kerala, he said he has always expressed his views fearlessly when it came to the betterment of the country and Kerala. “I do not believe in narrow political thinking, if opponents do something good, it should be appreciated. I have never been someone to consider political consequences before expressing an opinion on something I believe in. This is why I appreciate good things done by Congress’ rivals,” he said.

The Congress Working Committee member said it was at the request of senior Congress leaders, including Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh and Ramesh Chennithala, that he had left a comfortable post in the US to come back and join politics.

Tharoor also said others in the Congress share his views, and several workers feel there is an absence of a leader in Kerala’s Congress. He said the opinion polls conducted by independent organisations have also shown that he was ahead of the others in leadership stakes in Kerala. However, he refuted rumours of switching parties, saying he did not believe so even if there was a difference in opinions.

Responding to the remarks made by Tharoor in the podcast interview, KPCC President K Sudhakaran said what he (Shashi Tharoor) did through the media was not right. He has always supported him and that Tharoor can still correct himself. “Tharoor is a person of higher status than me. I am not the person to respond to what he said. It is not for the KPCC to look into it. Let Tharoor correct himself. I want his actions not to go beyond the limits,” he laborated.

Senior Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala said he did not want to react to Tharoor’s remarks but speculated that the latter might have given the podcast interview before he met Rahul Gandhi. “What I understand is that he gave the interview before meeting Rahul Gandhi. I don’t want to react to this because of that. We don’t want to make any controversy out of it,” he said.

“When I was the KPCC president, I had asked him to join the party when he was leaving the UN .I had also suggested that he contest in Palakkad,” he added.
Former KPCC president K Muraleedharan urged the party leadership to utilise Tharoor’s strengths, particularly his ability to engage in parliamentary debates and connect with young voters.

On Saturday, Tharoor shared a quote from English poet Thomas Gray’s poem ‘Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College’ on X, formerly Twitter under the caption “Thought of the Day”, reading: “Where ignorance is bliss, ‘tis folly to be wise.”

It appears that Tharoor has advocated for his candidacy as the party’s leader ahead of the 2026 Assembly polls, as he claimed in the interview that opinion polls from independent agencies indicated he was ahead of others in leadership stakes in the Congress in Kerala and that Congress suffers from a leadership vacuum in Kerala.

In this connection, after Tharoor’s interview became controversial, he came forward with an explanation. He said that there was no need to add fuel to the ongoing drama and that he had explained the matter in detail in the interview.