Congress drops Jaipur Dialogues' Sunil Sharma from Lok Sabha poll candidate list after Shashi Tharoor's tweet
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Reacting to the controversy on the nomination of Sunil Sharma as Lok Sabha candidate from Jaipur, Congress replaced him with Pratap Singh Kachariyawas in the updated Lok Sabha candidate list on Sunday. A day ago, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor took a jibe at his party over the selection of the Jaipur Dialogues director as a candidate.
Sharma's candidate raised controversy over his alleged association with ‘Jaipur Dialogue’. The social media handle is critical of the Congress on social media.
The issue was also raised by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor in his latest social media post. While attaching an earlier post by The Jaipur Dialogues, the Thiruvananthapuram MP wrote, “He must have undergone some sort of Pauline epiphany on the road to 24 Akbar! This is just one of several dozen tweets from his handle attacking me."
Amid allegations of Sharma's link with ‘Jaipur Dialogue', he has denied such claims and clarified that he has no association with the organisation. He also said that he has been invited by the group occasionally to present the Congress' view. Apart from objections raised by high-profilet Congress leaders like Tharoor, it was the local opposition that led to the change in Congress candidate from Jaipur, reported PTI citing sources.
Other members mentioned in the Congress Lok Sabha candidate list were Murari Lal Meena fielded from a Dausa Lok Sabha constituency of Rajasthan. The grand old party has also fielded Pratibha Suresh Dhanorkar from Maharashtra's Chandrapur seat for upcoming Lok Sabha elections 2024.
The Jaipur Dialogues was started by Sanjay Dixit in 2016. The group presents its views on a wide range of subjects including politics, governance, national security, foreign policy, economy, education, culture, history, and social issues, according to its social media handle bio. Sunil Sharma is also partner and director for the platform.
Referring to an incident of an IIT student joining terror group ISIS, Jaipur Dialogues wrote in its post, “They can be in IIT, in IIM, in Google, in Facebook, They can be Doctor, Lawyer, Journalist, Judge or Politician. It doesn't matter. All that matters is Islam. And Islam teaches to hate Kaafirs. An IIT Guwahati student Tauseef Ali Farooqi joined ISIS."