Shashi Tharoor can go out of Congress if he doesn't toe party line: Kerala Congress chief

Congress in the state has been on a highly volatile campaign against the high-speed rail project

The Congress leadership in Kerala has toughened its stand against Congress MP Shashi Tharoor over the high-speed rail project issue with party state president K Sudhakaran stating that those who do not follow the party line would be out of the party.

The Kerala PCC president told reporters on Sunday that Tharoor was just an individual member of the party. If he was not following the party line he would have to opt-out of the party.

While the Congress leadership had announced agitations against the proposed Thiruvananthapuram-Kasargod semi highspeed rail project, Tharoor was maintaining that he required more time to study about the project. He even kept off from signing on a petition filed by the Congress MPs from Kerala to the railway ministry objecting to the project.

Tharoor's stand irked the Congress leadership as the party had already conducted a detailed study with the help of experts about two months back and took its stand against the project.

Also read: Shashi Tharoor is now CPM's poster boy in Kerala

Even as Tharoor sought to justify his position stating that he only sought time to study the project and had not backed it, the ruling CPM is taking advantage of Tharoor's stand. Tharoor's subsequent praise for Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan's pro-development approach also made the CPM happy, while it caused further embarrassment to the Congress.

Many senior Congress leaders already expressed their resentment against Tharoor's stand openly. Coalition partners of the Congress were also unhappy over Tharoor's stand.

The 540 kilometre rail project aims at reducing travel time between Thiruvananthapuram in the south and Kasargod in the north to less than four hours while now it takes at least ten hours by road and rail. Huge financial commitments of over Rs. one lakh crore, ecological impacts and massive displacement of people are the major concerns being raised by those opposing the project. But the Pinarayi Vijayan government was reiterating that the project would be taken forward as it was essential for the state's development and economic progress.

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