Cong downplays Modi invite to Shashi Tharoor

The Congress on Thursday faced questions on Prime Minister Narendra Modi opting to invite party MP Shashi Tharoor to spread awareness about the “Clean India” initiative.

Launching the cleanliness drive, Modi invited nine prominent personalities, including Tharoor, to spread the message of ‘Clean India’.

Party leader Rajiv Shukla was quick to dismiss suggestions of “Tharoor inching towards the BJP”.

“That should not be the basis of any speculation about any individual. So I do not buy that. But at the same time I think that everybody should have been invited. Why only one or two individual?,” he said.

A view in the Congress was that perhaps Modi was eyeing Tharoor’s 2.39 million followers on Twitter to popularise his “Clean India” campaign.

Tharoor was on a flight to Romania for a conference when Modi made the announcement. “Honoured to accept the invitation of PM @narendramodi to join Clean India campaign. Just landed in Bucharest &heard d news. Action on return,” Tharoor tweeted.

At the same time, Tharoor made it clear that he was not a fan of tokenism. “Clean India is a great campaign but challenge will be to sustain it beyond a week of photo-ops. Mindsets must change,” he added.