DNA Edit: Tharoor speaks - His views on party leadership represent silent majority

Finally, at least there is someone in the Congress who has spoken up. Shashi Tharoor represents the majority view in the party when he says that elections are the best way to decide the Congress president, considering that Rahul Gandhi has categorically ruled himself out.

The Thiruvananthapuram Congress MP and flamboyant former UN diplomat told a newspaper that “elections would be the only way forward….We cannot be an undemocratic party in a democracy. We are fighting for democratic space and democratic rights.”

In a party where backstabbing and sweet talk go hand in hand, Tharoor needs to be commended. He has spoken his mind in an atmosphere where most others feel the same, but haven’t the courage to speak out for the fear of getting hounded and ostracised. 

And Tharoor said as much. “If tomorrow, one of these guys says I believe I am good enough to be president, the entire party will get together to stifle him,” he pointed out, rather candidly. Again, he was speaking for the rest of the crowd, many of them hugely talented individuals, who are feeling stifled in the Congress, amidst rumours that they may shift to the BJP.

Surely, the morass that the Congress now finds itself in has to prompt voices of reason, if not dissent. A party that has barely crossed the 50- mark in the Lok Sabha, surely has to have questions raised.

Theoretically, if the BJP had got 50 Lok Sabha seats, there would have been a storm in the party and questions would have been openly asked about the leadership. That such a thing has not happened in the Congress, is a disturbing sign that the party has turned moribund. Maybe, Tharoor deserves better than what he has got right now in the Lok Sabha.