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Congress spokespersons obliquely questioned the conscience of a party member who accepts such an invitation when the top leadership has been sidelined
Shashi Tharoor, who serves as the Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs, not only received an invitation but also confirmed his attendance. Image/ANI
The state banquet hosted by President Droupadi Murmu in honour of visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin became the setting for a minor diplomatic and significant political controversy. Amid a row over the exclusion of top opposition figures, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor was seen greeting Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman at the event, an interaction that quickly highlighted the deepening rift between the veteran diplomat-politician and his own party leadership.
The core of the controversy stemmed from the guest list. Congress leaders, including party president Mallikarjun Kharge and leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, were reportedly not invited to the high-profile diplomatic dinner at Rashtrapati Bhavan. This exclusion drew swift criticism from the Congress, with party leaders accusing the government of deliberately breaching protocol and undermining democratic conventions by excluding key opposition voices from a crucial state engagement.
In sharp contrast, Shashi Tharoor, who serves as the Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs, not only received an invitation but also confirmed his attendance, citing a long-standing, albeit recently lapsed, tradition of inviting the committee head to such state functions.
However, Tharoor’s presence, coupled with visual confirmation of his cordial interaction with senior ministers like Nirmala Sitharaman, exacerbated the “heartburn” within his own party. Congress General Secretary Jairam Ramesh publicly confirmed the exclusion of the two Leaders of the Opposition, while other party spokespersons obliquely questioned the conscience of a party member who accepts such an invitation when the top leadership has been sidelined.
Observers say that for the government, inviting Tharoor, with his extensive diplomatic background as a former UN Under-Secretary-General, could be seen as a non-partisan nod to the importance of the India-Russia relationship. For the Congress, however, the selective invitation and Tharoor’s subsequent attendance—while his senior colleagues were excluded—was perceived as a deliberate political strategy by the ruling party and a lack of solidarity from the Thiruvananthapuram MP, exposing a widening chasm within the principal opposition party.
Click here to add News18 as your preferred news source on Google. December 05, 2025, 23:43 IST
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