Senior Congress leader P. Chidambaram on Thursday questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s comments on the “skin colour of Indians,” calling them “irrelevant and blatantly racist.” Chidambaram’s remarks came after Modi criticized Congress leader Sam Pitroda for his analogy that compared Indians’ ethnic and racial identities with those of Chinese, Arabs, Whites, and Africans.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Chidambaram clarified the Congress party’s stand on fielding an opposition candidate against Droupadi Murmu during the Presidential elections in 2022, stating that decisions were based on politics, not skin colour. He said, “In the last election to the office of President of India, there were two candidates—Smt Droupadi Murmu and Shri Yashwant Sinha. The BJP and its allies supported Smt Murmu, while 17 Opposition parties, including Congress, supported Shri Sinha. Support for a candidate was not based on the colour of the skin. Opposition to a candidate was also not based on the colour of the skin.”
Chidambaram’s comments were in response to Prime Minister Modi’s criticism of Pitroda’s analogy. While addressing a rally in Telangana’s Warangal, Modi stated that Congress’s opposition to Droupadi Murmu could be linked to her being the daughter of an Adivasi family. He demanded answers from Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, stating, “My country will not tolerate the disrespect of my countrymen based on their skin colour, and Modi will never tolerate this.”
Chidambaram rejected the notion that opposition to Murmu’s candidacy had anything to do with her ethnicity, emphasizing that these were purely political decisions. He accused the Prime Minister of injecting a divisive and racist element into the debate, saying, “Why did the Hon’ble PM bring the colour of the skin into the election debate? PM’s remarks are completely irrelevant and blatantly racist.”
After Modi’s criticism, the Congress distanced itself from Pitroda’s remarks, labeling them as “most unfortunate and unacceptable.” Pitroda, an advisor to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, resigned from his position as the chief of the Indian Overseas Congress following the controversy, apparently after being urged to do so by the party leadership. This move reflects the Congress’s efforts to mitigate the damage and focus on its broader political narrative.
