Tharoor skips Priyanka-led protest in Parl complex over Kerala nuns’ arrest

The rift between the Congress seems to be widening as senior party leader Shashi Tharoor on Wednesday remained conspicuously absent from the protest, led by Priyanka Gandhi outside Parliament over the arrest of two nuns from the state in Chhattisgarh on charges of human trafficking and forced religious conversion.

Interestingly, Tharoor was part of a protest on the same issue on Tuesday, but not on Wednesday. He even told the reporters yesterday, “The nuns are innocent, they must be released. There should not be mob rule in the country. This is the government’s responsibility.”

His absence comes amid reports of his “strained” ties with the Congress leadership over his public remarks after the Pahalgam attack and Operation Sindoor. Tharoor has been on the receiving end of barbs from his party colleagues over his praise for the BJP government’s response to the Pahalgam attack.

Tharoor had recently said that his “first loyalty” lies with the nation. “Parties are a means of making the nation better. So to my mind, whichever party you belong to, the objective of that party is to create a better India in its own way,” he said.

The Congress, determined to corner the government on the sudden announcement of the ceasefire by US President Donald Trump and the intelligence failure that led to the Pahalgam attack, did not approve of Tharoor’s comments.

At the protest today, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said the nuns were accused of things they were not doing. “They were manhandled and then taken away by the Chhattisgarh Police. We are protesting against these kinds of attacks on minorities,” she said.

Tharoor has been in news for the past several months for his strained ties with the Congress leadership. The former diplomat was not on the Congress's list of speakers for the Operation Sindoor debate.

Sources in the Congress have said that the party had approached Tharoor to speak during the debate, but he refused to toe the party line and said he would not contradict himself “for the sake of party messaging”.