Shashi Tharoor : The rise and fall of an intellectual

Shashi Tharoor : The rise and fall of an intellectual.

Historically, the clan of “Tharoor” traces its origin to nearly two thousand years. They were an integral part of Namboodri’s, the great matriarchal lineage of Malabar - Theravada of Kerala, a community known for its learning, racial superiority and social exclusivity. Even today, a Nair (a member of this clan) in Kerala is a distinct breed; easily spotted by a demeanor that can only come with generations of genetic purity and polish. A cursory glance at Shashi Tharoor in the media, as he prepares to address an audience; or as he speaks in an interview; or as he saunters in a gathering, brushing shoulders with Lutyen’s crowd or seasoned intellectuals; or posing for a picture projecting his well-groomed persona embellished with impeccable taste - one senses, that, here is a man who was born privileged, bought up in the lap of luxury and now lives audaciously with aplomb and style.

Born in London in 1956; educated in Montfort, Campion and St Stephens, where he majored in History; wrote his first published short story at the age of ten; a novelist by the time he was eleven; studied law at the prestigious Tuft’s university, where he astonished his professors and peers with iridescent brilliance; founded and edited a Forum of International affairs in college, which is currently in its 35th year of publication; Joined the UN in 1976 as a junior staff member rose like a meteor in its glittering and rarefied air of political and diplomatic circles; promoted every four years until, in 1996, he landed as the executive assistant to the most powerful man (after the US President) in the Globe, Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary general; in 2001, he took over its communication’s wing - transforming the muddy, mechanical functioning of that crucial function into a vibrant, relevant and pulsating arm of the UN; spoke and wrote with great erudition and sensitivity on Antisemitism, terrorism and neglected ideological issues; positioned himself to become the next Secretary general in 2006, which if attained, would have made him the second youngest man to scale that height in the history of UN. In the middle of all this tremendously active years of professional life, he found time to marry and divorce twice, fathering a couple of sons, who in their right are doing very well for themselves; published five works of fiction and seven collections of Nonfiction - with a writing style worthy of a Voltaire , Shaw or a Montaigne; commissioned to pen regular columns for Newsweek, New York times, Times of India, Herald tribune and many others; a sought after socialite across the world , at ease both with glamour and intellect - Shashi Tharoor in short is the quintessential debonair intellectual that one can ever aspire to be. There is nothing that he could do wrong, until he made the fatal decision of joining the Indian political fray that was largely unused to the finesse, grace and bearing that Tharoor bought with him.

The Indian Government welcomed his participation. For a system that is so bereft of quality Statesmen, a Man like Tharoor would have been a dream come true. They offered him choice portfolios, assuaged his seething intellectualism, and inducted him into native subtleties of running a democratic government in a Developing country, where power centers normally operate at the bottom and not at the top, and almost everything is up for sale at a price. From 2008 onward, Tharoor began his perilous descent into the vortex of unorganized diplomacy, corrupt and avaricious politics of his party, playing into the hands of money mongering mafia dons who were using him as a means to an end; and a playing field that was so largely different from the clean and polished power corridors of the United Nations he was used to.

However, his nemesis figuratively and literally began with his involvement with a form of cricket that really does not deserve the name of Cricket at all. For a man who has all along lived his life in the fullness of his intellect, his morbid attraction to this mockery of a game is nothing but surprising. Possibly, he misunderstood T-20 with professional baseball in the USA, where rules and statues are strict and there is an unwritten code of conduct and ethics that governs baseball, which have rarely been violated in a hundred odd years the sport has been professionally in vogue. Wedded for the third time to Sunanda Pushkar (whom he met at a party hosted in Dubai by a Millionaire Philanthropist) a divorcee, struggling with an ailing kid, with no stable occupation or compatible intellectual stature - Tharoor ventured into this unknown territory of corruption and malfeasance, using her as his public persona, while still being an active Minister in the Government. It ultimately cost Sunanda her life.

The rise and fall of Shashi Tharoor raises a very important question, and I seem to be hearing it from everybody I speak to. That is “How can an educated and intelligent man like Shashi Tharoor take such bad decisions in life. How could he have fallen so low? “Well, the answer is pretty rudimentary. It is a common fallacy that we fall into when we think of intelligence as a product of formal education or qualifications. It has nothing to do with it except to the extent that it can streamline our instincts to make judicious choices when necessary. Being “intelligent” is a gut feel of what is wrong and right courses of action in a given circumstance, and history has proven over and over again that not every educated person is an intelligent person. I remember watching one of Maya Angelou last interviews with Oprah Winfrey where she said:

…..Intelligence doesn't mean educated. Intelligence doesn't mean intellectual. I mean really intelligent. What black old people used to call ‘mother wit’ means intelligence that you had in your mother’s womb. That’s what you rely on. You know what’s right to do….” This is almost a Zen-like statement from the great lady…

Shashi Tharoor could have chosen for himself any role he wished to take on, but all his erudition could not stop him from making the worst possible choice - slipping into murky Indian politics without any background whatsoever. He believed that his unabashed intellectualism and charisma would be a Midas touch but scarcely did he realize that he was entering into a different zone altogether, where none of his high browed learning would ever come in handy. He should have listened to his guts; but then, as if so often the case, the overwhelming voice of reason sometimes drowns the silent whispers of inner prompting.

In a way, I feel sad for Shashi Tharoor. On television and printed media, he is being maligned, embarrassed and questioned by people who are no match for his caliber. But that is the price one pays for having slipped down the precipice. At the back of my mind, I am still optimistic that he will come out of this clean, and that he was not in any way involved in the alleged murder of his last wife. But even if he does come out of it, he would have lost a lot of his credibility in the mind of people. But frankly, if you ask me, I think he wouldn't mind that. That is the joy of being an intellectual. One could retire into the cocoon of one’s abstractions and be oblivious of the world and its maddening noises. And I feel, Shashi Tharoor will do just that.

God bless…