Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Friday said that Indians need to be “less thin-skinned”, a day after the Ministry of External Affairs expressed objections on a comment made by Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
During a debate in the Singapore Parliament on Tuesday, Lee had said that “Nehru’s India” has become a country where “almost half the MPs in the Lok Sabha have criminal charges pending against them, including charges of rape and murder”.
On Thursday, the external affairs ministry summoned Singapore High Commissioner Simon Wong to say that Lee’s remarks were “uncalled for.”
In a tweet on Friday, Tharoor said that Lee was making a “general and largely accurate point”.
“Most unseemly for the Ministry of External Affairs to summon the high commissioner of a friendly country like Singapore over remarks by their PM to their own Parliament,” Tharoor wrote on Twitter.
Tharoor suggested that the Indian government should have instead said that it does not comment on the internal matters or Parliament debates of other nations and urged foreign countries to follow the same principle.
Such an approach would have been “far more effective and less offensive”, Tharoor wrote on Twitter.
Limited-time offer: Big stories, small price. Keep independent media alive. Become a Scroll member today!
Our journalism is for everyone. But you can get special privileges by buying an annual Scroll Membership. Sign up today!