Minister Twitter's Tweet-22

To Tweet or Not Tweet?!

I start with stating a fact: I am a great fan of Shashi Tharoor! Therefore, my views as an individual on the recent Twitter controversies is an honest attempt to understand the whole thing comprehensively, which also has expressions of concern embedded for him – all done as his sincere and selfless admirer - and nothing more.

“To Tweet or Not Tweet” will apparently become a dilemma with Shashi Tharoor as he lands himself in difficulty quite frequently with his tweets! As an individual I fully support his rights to indulge in his hobby. However, what I do not approve of – again, my personal opinion as an Indian citizen; remember he is our minister-of-state for External Affairs – is his obsession with tweeting! He seems to have got carried away with the number of “followers” on his twitter page which has crossed half a million mark, the highest for an Indian. I too am his “follower” in that sense of the term! And so is his Boss, SM Krishna, and here, on the Twitter site, they both are on the “same page”, at least!

As a hobby if Shashi Tharoor uses twitter for posting his views on myriad and mundane subjects of the world including his personal life, that should not be anyone’s concern. But it looks like he has got a bit disillusioned: he often treats his tweets as a tool to “remain in touch” with the aam aadmi! He forgets he is a minister and that he cannot – and should not - conduct his ministerial work in a public forum. He is not a newspaper columnist, anymore! He is a responsible member of the council of union ministers!

Imagine, if in the name of “democratic rights” – inspired by Shashi Tharoor, of course - every member of the UPA government – ministers, MPs – starts using numerous social networking sites – Twitter is one such site – to express views on government’s policies etc., what will happen to the overall functioning of the Indian administration? I also wonder if Shashi Tharoor will ever exercise his “democratic rights” – as his “followers” would like to put it – against the Prime Minister or his party’s President? I am sure he must be having many points of disagreements with them too. I already see Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi reach out for Saridon!

Or, for that matter - just stretching my horizon of imagination a bit in the hindsight – would Shashi Tharoor have used Twitter to comment on his UN boss Kofi Annan or the colossal body’s mostly controversial functioning? No, I am sure of that.

Therefore, I wonder why our highly competent minister has forgotten all his diplomatic lessons. He is after all an accomplished international diplomat. No one can understand it better that politics, like diplomacy, is a sensitive subject, which needs to be conducted in a matured manner. And a ministerial post is equally sensitive, and responsible. I do not blame SM Krishna for using the media – a public forum – to reprimand his deputy; he was clearly hugely miffed. Any Boss, in every field, would get wild at the “wild” acts of his junior! (The world will collapse if everybody started using Twitter to conduct business!) Shashi Tharoor himself will not like any of his staff member adopt such ways.

Moreover, he has just started out in the field of politics. He has to establish his credentials here too; his fan following from his author days or his “followers” will not help him much in the long run. Media attention to his tweets should not blind him. After all, he has enjoyed – and continues to – the “limelight” for ages. Also, his party superiors may find difficult to defend him every time. As a minister he should concentrate more on his actual work rather than get distracted by a trivial thing as Twitter. He has all the necessary skills to get counted as the best ever foreign minister; he simply has to reapply himself in his job, fulltime. I am sure, even SM Krishna realizes Shashi Tharoor’s worth. Otherwise, with anybody else, for similar “transgressions”, he would have acted really tough. And so would have the Congress.

Therefore, tweet Mr. Minister as much as you like, but remember that you are capable of being much more than just a “Minister Twitter”; do not let those 140 alphabets control you, or get you “out of control”, as your Boss would like to say!

Happy Tweeting :)