Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Friday refuted former US President Donald Trump's comment describing India "a dead economy," stating that such a thing is not true. His response was made a day after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi publicly concurred with Trump's assertion.
"This is not the truth, and we all know this," Mr Tharoor responded while speaking to the media outside Parliament, when questioned about Mr Trump's tweet.
The scandal started on Thursday when Trump attacked India and Russia in a Truth Social post. In biting words, he stated, "I don't care what India does with Russia. They can take their dead economies down together, for all I care. We have done very little business with India, their tariffs are too high, among the highest in the world. Likewise, Russia and the USA do almost no business together. Let's keep it that way." His tweet followed his announcement of imposing 25 percent tariffs on Indian imports, together with additional sanctions for buying Russian defense and energy goods.
Soon after Trump's statement, Rahul Gandhi also expressed his concurrence. "He is correct, everyone else knows this except the Finance Minister and the Prime Minister. I am relieved that President Trump has spoken a truth," he said in a statement to the media at Parliament, refusing to back down.
But not everyone in the Congress party was as one. Congress MP Karti Chidambaram abstained from Gandhi's stand, calling Trump an "unconventional politician."
India and America are big economies and they require each other. We have people-to-people relations as well. Backing and forth of statements by the president of the United States are not going to jeopardize this relationship in the long term," Chidambaram said in an interview with NDTV.
He added, “President Trump has made similar comments about many countries and many international personalities, but he's eventually gone on to come to some sort of understanding with them.”
Echoing similar sentiments, Rajya Sabha MP and senior Congress leader Rajiv Shukla also dismissed Trump's description of India's economic scenario. "Our economic condition is not weak at all. If someone says that they can finish us economically, it must be because of a misunderstanding. Trump is in a delusion," he said to ANI.
