Shashi Tharoor's apology for 'eunuch' jibe at Kejriwal backfires

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has been leading aggressive criticism of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal over the latter's perceived lack of support for those protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and for not visiting JNU after the mob attack on January 5.

But on Monday and Tuesday, Tharoor himself was in hot water over a comment he made against Kejriwal. Worse, Tharoor's apology for the comment appeared to have cut no ice with his critics.

On Monday, during an interview with News 18, Tharoor accused Kejriwal of criticising the Citizenship Act and NRC, but not taking any "tangible" action against it. He also slammed Kejriwal for not visiting students injured in the mob violence at JNU.

"In any other state, had students been bashed up in this manner, the chief minister would have visited them and shown them some concern. Mr Kejriwal really wants power without responsibility, which we all know has been the prerogative of eunuchs for ages," Tharoor said on News 18.

Soon, the eloquent Congress MP was bombarded with criticism of being homophobic. After midnight, Tharoor issued an apology on Twitter. He wrote, "Apologies to those who found my quote about 'power without responsibility' offensive. It's an old line from British politics, going back to Kipling & Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, &most recently used by Tom Stoppard. I recognize that its use today was inappropriate &withdraw it.”

However, critics soon took issue with Tharoor for emphasising on the "power without responsibility" argument and not explicitly mentioning the reference to 'eunuch'.

Moreover, Tharoor appears to have ignored the differences in the quotes by the speakers mentioned in his tweet. Stanley Baldwin, who was prime minister of the UK between the two World Wars, had compared press barons of the time to harlots. Baldwin, a cousin of writer Rudyard Kipling, borrowed Kipling's words when he said in 1931, "What the proprietorship of these papers is aiming at is power, but power without responsibility, the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages".

Playwright Tom Stoppard had used the "power without responsibility" argument while referring to politicians in his novel Lord Malquist and Mr Moon, which was first published in 1966. Stoppard had written, "The House of Lords, an illusion to which I have never been able to subscribe—responsibility without power, the prerogative of the eunuch throughout the ages."

Journalist Aditya Menon pointed to the difference in the quotes between Baldwin and Stoppard to Tharoor. Menon wrote, "… if I'm not mistaken the Baldwin quote referred to harlot not eunuch. Stoppard's was 'responsibility without power is the prerogative of the eunuch' also used by Sir Humphrey in Yes Minister. In either case not appropriate in our context."