‘Godse ke daur mein…’: Shashi Tharoor as he joins Rahul Gandhi's padyatra

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor joined party colleague Rahul Gandhi in the ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra’ on Monday. In Kerala's Palakkad, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor claimed he has the support of party workers from across the country for his bid to fight the Congress president elections.

In the evening, Tharoor chose to share a poem of Imran Pratapgarhi, Congress Rajya Sabha MP and Urdu poet, to take an apparent dig at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

“Who told you that I am with the storm, I am with Gandhi in the era of Godse. ~ Imran Pratapgarhi of ⁦@INCIndia,” Tharoor tweeted in Hindi sharing a video clip of him and Rahul Gandhi from the yatra.

The Congress's Bharat Jodo Yatra will cover 3,570 kilometres in 150 days. It started from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu on September 7 and will conclude in Jammu and Kashmir.

⁩But more than joining the yatra the media was eager to take Tharoor's byte for his nomination for the Congress chief's poll, and the party's Thiruvananthapuram MP didn't disappoint any.

While Tharoor said it was a courtesy call as Rahul Gandhi was in his home district, he, reacting to a query on his candidature for the Congress president's post, said, "You will see the support I enjoy when I submit my nomination paper. I will be in the fray if I get support from party workers from the majority of the states. So many people from different parts of the country have requested me to be in the fray."

The Thiruvananthapuram MP, who has got the nomination form for the poll collected from the Congress headquarters last Saturday, said a candidate should fight the polls with confidence.

“I have got the form. I am meeting people and talking to them,” he said.

According to a notification issued by the party on Thursday, the process for filing nominations for the election will be held from September 24 to 30.

The date for scrutinising the nomination papers is October 1, while the last date for withdrawal of nominations is October 8. The final list of candidates will be published at 5 pm on October 8. The polling, if needed, will be held on October 17. The counting of votes will be taken up on October 19 and the results will be declared the same day.

(With inputs from PTI)