Congress veteran and a known Gandhi family loyalist Mohsina Kidwai, senior leader from Kashmir Saifuddin Soz and his son Salman Soz, Lok Sabha MPs Karti Chidambaram, M.K. Raghavan and Pradyut Bordoloi are among the leaders who signed the nomination papers of 'anti-establishment' candidate Shashi Tharoor for the election to the post of party president.
Tharoor tweeted to reveal the 60 names that chose to take his side as his proposers as he entered the fray for the Congress presidential election in which he is up against party veteran and de facto official candidate Mallikarjun Kharge.
Kidwai's name figuring as a Tharoor backer in the intra-party election is surprising since she is known to have been close to the Gandhi family. As per the nomination papers, photos of which were tweeted by Tharoor, Kidwai signed on as a proposer on September 30, the day the nomination was to be filed and apparently after it became clear that Kharge was the Gandhi family's choice for the top job in the party.
The Soz's too feature in the list of proposers, and they had signed on the nomination papers on September 25, a day after Tharoor had collected the papers from the office of the Congress's Central Election Authority.
Former Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s son and former MP Sandeep Dikshit is perhaps the only member of the so-called G-23 grouping to sign on Tharoor's nomination. There are three sitting Lok Sabha MPs in the list—Chidambaram, Raghavan and Bordoloi.
Another interesting name in the list is that of Anil K. Antony, son of party veteran and staunch family loyalist A.K. Antony, who was the lead proposer in the nomination of Kharge. Anil is a national co-coordinator of Congress' social media and digital communications cell. He also tweeted in support of Tharoor, saying, “Irrespective of the outcome, the message of change & standing for the pluralistic idea of India that Shashi Tharoor advocates for is a must for any prospective Congress revival. Proud to call him one of my mentors. Wish you the very best as you take this significant step”.
Karti tweeted, “I am privileged to be one of the 60 Congress delegates who signed the nomination form of Shashi Tharoor. We need to usher in bold new thinking and action into our party’s functioning”.
Tharoor had tweeted photos of the nomination papers, writing that he had got the backing of leaders from 12 states and they belonged to all levels of leadership.
“I thank them and the thousands of of workers they represent for the faith they have placed in me. Thanks, my Parliamentary colleagues, for your unwavering support,” he tweeted.
Tharoor's home state figures prominently in his nomination, with at least 13 proposers from Kerala backing him. There are proposers from other states too, including from Tamil Nadu, Bihar, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Assam, Jharkhand, Punjab, West Bengal, Jammu and Kashmir and Nagaland.
