Shashi Tharoor speaks at Mannam Jayanthi celebrations | Photo: Mathrubhumi
Perunna (Kottayam): In a covert comment aimed at the Congress leadership in Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor said that he understood the saying of Mannathu Padmanabhan that “one Nair cannot stand another.”
He was speaking at a public conference during the Mannam Jayanthi celebrations at the headquarters of Nair Services Society.
“Mannam said that decades ago. I recognize it in politics,” he said. The comment is viewed as a covert attack on leaders like Ramesh Chennithala and VD Satheesan. After engaging in various public and party events across Kerala recently, Tharoor had a tense relationship with the Kerala leadership of the party.
It may be noted that Tharoor is the only politician who was invited to the major event of one of the most powerful caste organisations in Kerala.
Tharoor also expressed his concern over unemployment rate among the youth in Kerala.
"No other state is showing such concerning figures of unemployment among the youth. In other states those uneducated or unskilled are the ones lacking jobs. However, in Kerala everyone is literate, educated and has passed class 10, yet a lot of them do not have jobs," the Thiruvananthapuram MP said.
Tharoor said 3.5 lakh professional and technical job-seekers, including 9,000 medical graduates, were registered as job-seekers in the southern state's employment exchange.
Of the 3.5 lakh job-seekers, around 71 per cent have ITI certificates, he added.
"This is the state of affairs in Kerala. Therefore, there is no doubt that the state needs to open its doors to bring in more investment. We need to create more employment opportunities," he said.
The MP said that a lot of youngsters are going outside the state for job opportunities and that should be seen as a loss for Kerala.
"We must make Kerala more attractive for our young people," was a solution he offered.
For long, the NSS soft corner towards the Congress was well known; but in the past several years, they have maintained an 'equidistant' stand to the traditional political fronts in Kerala.
The organisation's relationship with VD Satheesan is not rosy as of now.
Sukumaran Nair had said that Satheesan sought the support of the NSS during election time and after winning he had disowned it.
It was known to all that had it not been the strong influence of Sukumaran Nair, that the then state Congress president Ramesh Chennithala was given the Home portfolio by the then Congress Chief Minister Oommen Chandy.
Ever since Tharoor decided to contest the presidential poll, barring a section of the Congress leaders, his popularity among all the allies of the Congress-led UDF had picked up hugely.
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