Shashi Tharoor, the Minister of State for External Affairs, in the eye of the storm after his “cattle class’ comments, may escape punishment at the hands of the party.
The strongest indication of the party’s decision to put the matter to rest came following Rajhasthan Chief Minister Ashok Ghelot’s meeting with the Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Saturday. Emerging from his meeting the Chief Minister said the “matter is over”.
The move comes a day after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh sought to defuse the situation by suggesting that Tharoor’s comments were made light heartedly.
Other senior government functionaries also made light of Tharoor’s comments saying they were made either in jest or ignorance. “His mistake is that he accepts people to appreciate western humor,” a senior minister told the DNA.
Others felt that his remarks though “politically incorrect’, did not have any malicious intent.
Earlier Tharoor had also sought to make amends by apologizing for his remarks. The Minister posted an apology on Twitter saying it “was a silly expression but meant no disrespect to economy travelers, only to airlines for herding us in like cattle. Many have misunderstood. To those hurt by the belief that my repeating the phrase showed contempt: sorry,” he said.
His remark that he would travel “cattle class in solidarity with all our holy cows”, also in a ‘Twitter’ posting, had come in the backdrop of an austerity drive in the Government and in Congress. The comment had been strongly rebuked by the party.
However the party appears to have now decided to give the matter a quiet burial, indications are that either the Prime Minister or a senior Government minister is likely “to have a quiet word with Tharoor advising him to be careful of public sensitivities while speaking in public or in his writings.
