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Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Wednesday refuted the alleged controversy over his remarks in a podcast to an English daily, saying that it was a 45-minute conversation about life and nothing about any political controversy.
He said he could not comprehend the controversial angle in his conversation during the podcast. "You all heard the podcast. What was the controversy about? I still haven't understood the controversy. Now that you have heard the whole podcast, can you tell me what your question is? I am happy to respond. It is a podcast, a 45-minute conversation about life and pursuits of happiness, nothing there much about any political controversy," Tharoor told reporters. He said that a party meeting has been scheduled for Friday, for which he will be present. On Sunday, amidst reports that all is not well between him and the Congress following backlash from within the party on his apparent praise recently for Kerala Left Democratic Front (LDF) government's industrial policy and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Tharoor refused to comment further on the subject. "No comments at all," said the Congress MP from Thiruvananthapuram as reporters accosted him at the New Delhi airport. This follows an interview to the podcast for a leading newspaper published from New Delhi today in its English edition, in which he noted that if the Congress did not try to expand its appeal, it would be sitting in opposition for the third consecutive time in Kerala. Further, he was cited as saying that "several workers feel that there is an absence of a leader in Kerala's Congress." He also said that he was elected as MP four times from Thiruvananthapuram and that if the Congress did not need his services, he had "other options" including speaking tours and books. Moreover, Tharoor shared a selfie with Union Minister Piyush Goyal and Britain's Secretary of State Jonathan Reynolds, which intensified buzz surrounding his remarks regarding Congress. (ANI)
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