Shashi Tharoor defends 'Malayali Taliban' tweet

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor caused a flutter on Twitter on Tuesday when he tweeted a brief video clip of what appeared to be Taliban fighters. The clip had been shared on Twitter on August 15 and described, "Taliban fighter weeping in Joy as they reached outside Kabul knowing there victory is eminent."

Tharoor wrote that it sounded as if there were at least two Malayali Taliban members audible in the video clip. Tharoor tweeted, "It sounds as if there are at least two Malayali Taliban here—one who says 'samsarikkette' around the 8-second mark & another who understands him!" Samsarikette is one of the Malayalam words for talking.

Not surprisingly, Tharoor's tweet led to disagreements, with some Twitter users questioning the MP's own knowledge of Malayalam.

Ramiz Reports, the Twitter handle that had shared the video clip of the Taliban fighters, tweeted that there were no Taliban fighters from Kerala and instead the speakers heard in the video were speaking Bravhi, a Dravidian language used by the Balochs.

Ramiz Reports tweeted, "There are no #kerala origin fighters in rank and file of #taliban they are #baloch from #zabul province who speak brahvi and bravhi language is widely spoken among them,its a darvidian language very similar to telgu tamil malyalam etc".

Tharoor responded to the tweet by Ramiz Reports by pointing out there had been "misguided Malayalis who joined the Taliban". Tharoor tweeted, "Interesting explanation. WIll leave it to the linguists to figure this one out. But there have indeed been misguided Malayalis who joined the Taliban, so that possibility cannot be ruled out entirely."

Multiple Muslims from Kerala have been arrested on suspicion of having links to the Islamic State group in recent years. In 2017, the Kerala Police had claimed around 100 people from the state had joined the Islamic State.