'Zealots fulminating about my supposed ignorance': Tharoor hits back at criticism over LoC remark

New Delhi: Congress MP Shashi Tharoor late on Thursday hit back at critics over his recent comments on India crossing the Line of Control (LoC), clarifying that he was specifically referring to reprisals for terrorist attacks, not past wars.

"After a long and successful day in Panama, I have to wind up at midnight here with departure for Bogotá, Colombia in six hours, so I don’t really have time for this — but anyway..." Tharoor posted on X, responding to mounting criticism.

“For those zealots fulminating about my supposed ignorance of Indian valour across the LoC... I was clearly and explicitly speaking only about reprisals for terrorist attacks and not about previous wars... But as usual, critics and trolls are welcome to distort my views and words as they see fit. I genuinely have better things to do. Goodnight,” he wrote.

Tharoor's clarification came barely hours after his fellow Congress leaders launched a scathing attack on him for his comments during the Operation Sindoor outreach in Panama, where he reportedly stated that India had crossed the LoC for the first time in September 2015 under the current BJP government.

Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera countered Tharoor’s claim by posting a video of former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, in which Singh acknowledged multiple surgical strikes conducted during the UPA tenure. Khera stressed that such operations were not unprecedented.

The row began when Udit Raj said, "Shashi Tharoor had gone there (leading a multi-party delegation) to expose Pakistan. But it is surprising that he is trying to erase the golden history of Congress, that before Modi's regime, no surgical strike was done, that the LoC and International Border were never crossed before. This incorrect...Shashi Tharoor should definitely be given some award, because perhaps not even a member of the BJP can lie like this that LoC and International Border were never crossed before."