An illuminating session at Zee JLF.
The last session on Day 2 of Zee JLF 2019 got off to a rapturous start after journalist Sreenivasan Jain goaded Shashi Tharoor and Pavan K Varma about the number of literature festivals they attend and wondered whether their party heads ever pulled them up for the constant hopping.
The discussion soon moved to more serious topics like black-and-white state of debates.
Here are some highlights from the illuminating conversation:
Hitting the Gandhi ceiling?
When asked about hitting the glass Gandhi ceiling in Congress, Sreenivasan Jain pointed out that while Tharoor could aspire to be Secretary General at United Nations, he could never harbour similar aspirations in this own party.
To that Tharoor replied: “The reality is that no one will win a fair election against the current president of the party, he has the workers support.”
He added for him politics wasn’t about personal positions but trying to drive change, and if he could serve in government, it’d be an added bonus.
Coalition politics?
Meanwhile, when Pavan Varma was asked about the being a vocal critic of BJP at times, despite being in a coalition government with the former, he said that each constituent in an alliance could have separate views.
He said: “There’s no law that states have to follow what the single-largest party is saying.” He said that JD(U) differed with BJP on various issues like communalism, the Citizenship Amendment Bill and the Triple Talaq bill.
When asked why JD(U) were still with the BJP, he reiterated that there was no guarantee that the next coalition wouldn't have different worldviews.
He said: “We must mature to the point, that if you differ, it's not a sign of disloyalty or betrayal but a matter of principle. Our principle must be accepted.”
This led Tharoor to share an interesting anecdote of an earlier book launch. He said when the session began Varma was an ally in Bihar – the RJD, JD(U) and Congress alliance in Bihar – but he had to leave midway to defend his leader Nitish Kumar when he quit the alliance.
Sabarimala – faith vs judiciary
Tharoor also broached the sticky wicket of Sabarimala, an issue for which his views have received a lot of flak from liberals.
He said: “I welcomed the SC judgment, but it was an intellectual discussion. I also live in the real world, I represent 2 million people and I have to be responsive. When I talked to my constituents, I saw that a large number of women thought it was a visceral assault on something they held intimately precious. For them, it wasn’t about equality.”
He went on to add that there were temples where men were not allowed as well.
On secular politics
On the topic of secular politics and the perception that middle ground has shifted to the right, Pavan K Varma explained that while India was a plural country that respected all faiths, there was a perception that a politics of appeasement existed for minority votes. He added: “It started with the Shah Bano case. A ruling of the Supreme Court was overruled by an ordinance. Over a period of time, there existed certain parties doing minority appeasement.” He noted that now there was a backlash against this perception.
On thread politics
Speaking about the supposed Congress' turn to soft Hindutva, Tharoor dismissed notion saying Hinduism is inclusive while Hindutva was exclusive.
When asked why Rahul Gandhi visited just one victim of lynching as opposed to so many temples, he said that visiting temples, mosques or churches was part of the nation’s culture and one did it when welcomed by people.
Tharoorism vs Nepotism
Even during the Q&A session, the question of nepotism arose when one questioner (and a self-professed fan) asked when Tharoorism – a buzzword to describe Tharoor’s impact on the internet generation’s vocabulary – would free the Congress of nepotism?
This led to an impassioned defence of the Congress president as Tharoor tried to explain that Gandhi’s real persona didn’t match his popular caricature. He pointed out that Gandhi ran campaigns in the five states in the recent elections of which Congress wrested control from BJP in three and urged the audience to ‘give him a chance’.
Author for PM?
When asked when India would’ve an author-who-turned into a prime minister after a ‘paradoxical one and an ‘accidental’ one, all of the panelists pointed out that the very first PM was a great writer as well.
Varma joked that ‘all good things take time’ while Sreenivasan Jain pointed out that if ZEE JLF’s audience had its way Tharoor would be the Prime Minister and Varma the Finance Minister.
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 "A captivated audience listening to an engrossing conversation between Tharoor, Varma and Jain")
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