HYDERABAD/NEW DELHI: A day after triggering a political firestorm calling party MP Shashi Tharoor a ‘donkey’, Telangana Congress chief A Revanth Reddy on Thursday withdrew his remark. Revanth, who had gone to Bengaluru to attend Oscar Fernandes’ last rites, had initially denied making the donkey comment and even called Telangana IT and industries minister KT Rama Rao a liar for tweeting ‘fake news’ but his audio clip went viral forcing him to backtrack.
Revanth tweeted: spoke to shri @ShashiTharoorji to convey that I hereby withdraw the remarks and reiterate that I hold my senior colleague in the highest regard. I regret any hurt that may have been caused to him by my words. We share our faith in the values and policies of the Congress Party.”
“And I know he joins me in wanting Congress to win the support of the public to form the next government in Telangana,” Revanth tweeted.
Revanth had lashed out at Tharoor on Wednesday while responding to media queries over the latter having praised the TRS government while leading the parliamentary standing committee on IT during its visit to Hyderabad and meeting KT Rama Rao, and IT sector representatives
Tharoor had reacted to Revanth’s barb in his own inimitable style in a tweet by calling the “unwarranted reaction” as “an expression of fraternal feeling.” But by then the audio clip of Revanth calling Tharoor a “gadha (donkey)” had gone viral on social media. KTR posted an audio clip of Revanth calling Tharoor a donkey and tweeted: “as the chairman of the IT standing committee, Shashi Tharoor had paid some compliments to the efforts of the state government recently, His colleague in parliament and PCC cheap calls him a donkey!! This is what happens when you have a 3rd rate criminal/ thug leading the party.”
Tharoor clarified that he was in Hyderabad for the meeting of the parliamentary panel and his comments were confined to appreciating the government’s work in the IT sector. “Such a reaction was totally unwarranted and may have been based on inaccurate information about what I said and the circumstances in which it was said,” he told TOI. Sources in the Congress said the party high command took a serious note of Revanth Reddy lashing out at a senior MP like Tharoor. There are already complaints against Revanth from his own party men about his language, tone and tenor.
Party MP and former Union minister Manish Tewari too had reacted to Revanth’s barb and tweeted that the latter could have called Tharoor to clarify the issue before making such remarks.
