Shashi Tharoor says he will not accept award named after VD Savarkar

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Wednesday said he will not accept an award named after Hindutva ideologue VD Savarkar, which is being conferred by a non-governmental organisation, the Highrange Rural Development Society.

The award was to be presented at a ceremony in Delhi on Wednesday, according to social media posts by the organisation. The event was to be inaugurated by Union minister Rajnath Singh and Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha was the chief guest.

Tharoor was to be among six award winners.

The Congress MP said he had come to know through reports that he had been named a recipient of the award. “I only learned about this announcement yesterday in Kerala, where I had gone to vote in the local self-government elections,” he said on social media.

He added that in Thiruvananthapuram on Tuesday, he had told reporters that he was “neither aware of, nor had accepted, such an award”.

Tharoor said it was “irresponsible on the part of the organisers” to announce his name without him having agreed to receiving it.

“In the absence of clarifications about the nature of the award, the organisation presenting it or any other contextual details, the question of my attending the event today or accepting the award does not arise,” the Thiruvananthapuram MP said.

Aji Krishnan, the founder and secretary of the non-governmental organisation, told The Indian Express that Tharoor had been chosen for the award because of his “work towards nation building”.

The decision of conferring Tharoor with the award had been communicated to the Congress leader “a month back”, the newspaper quoted Krishnan as saying.

“We met Tharoor at his house, informed him about the award and invited him to the function,” he said. “Besides, two weeks ago, our jury chairman, Ravi Kanth, met Tharoor at his house.”

Krishnan added that there had been “no issue” and that Tharoor “had agreed to accept the award and attend the event”.

“He might have faced pressure from Congress,” the newspaper quoted Krishnan as saying.

Earlier on Wednesday, Congress leader K Muraleedharan told reporters in Thiruvananthapuram that no member of the party, including Tharoor, should accept an award in the name of Savarkar “as he had bowed before the British”, PTI reported.

Muraleedharan added that he does not think Tharoor will accept the award as it would insult and embarrass the Congress, the news agency added.

While Hindutva parties, including the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, have adopted Savarkar as an icon, the Congress' views about him have hardened over the decades. The Congress has criticised Savarkar, claiming he asked for mercy after being jailed by the colonial government.

Tharoor and the Congress have in recent months taken different positions.

On November 19, the Congress said that it found no reason to praise Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Ramnath Goenka Lecture, and wondered how Tharoor found a reason to do so.

Party Spokesperson Supriya Shrinate was answering about Tharoor having described Modi's speech as a blend of “economic outlook and a cultural call to action, urging the nation to be restless for progress”.

On November 9, the Congress had dissociated itself from a social media post by Tharoor in which he had described Bharatiya Janata Party leader and former Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani as a “true statesman”.

In July, the party had distanced itself from Tharoor's praise for Modi's approach to the India-Pakistan conflict in May.

Source: Scroll
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