Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has condemned the Emergency for its “unspeakable cruelty” and “erosion of freedom”, blaming Indira Gandhi and her younger son Sanjay Gandhi.

His comments, coming a day after he openly endorsed a survey favouring him as Kerala chief minister, seemed to touch a raw nerve in the state Congress unit.

However, Tharoor’s article, published by the Prague-based Project Syndicate, also contains veiled censure of the Narendra Modi government as an “overweening executive” that “can pose a grave danger to democracy” — a point that seemed to pass some of his Congress colleagues by.

“The quest for ‘discipline’ and ‘order’ often translated into unspeakable cruelty, exemplified by the forced vasectomy campaigns led by Gandhi’s son, Sanjay, and concentrated in poorer and rural areas, where coercion and violence were used to meet arbitrary targets,” Tharoor’s article, a translation of which was published in a Malayalam media outlet on Thursday, says.

“Slum demolitions, carried out with ruthless efficiency in urban centres like New Delhi, rendered thousands homeless, with little to no concern for their welfare.”

Several senior Congress leaders in Kerala on Thursday took potshots at Tharoor, whose praise of Prime Minister Modi and support for some of his policies has earned him much opprobrium from party colleagues over the past few months.

Many questioned the veracity of the survey by Vote Vibe, which portrayed Tharoor as the most popular chief ministerial candidate in Keralaand which the MP shared on his X profile.

Tharoor’s critics stressed that the websites www.shashitharoor.in and www.votevibe.in had both been registered through the same Mumbai-based company.

Peeved Congress leaders in Kerala have complained to the AICC leadership against the latest comments by Tharoor, who happens to be a member of the party’s highest body, the Congress Working Committee.

Kerala leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan told reporters that he preferred to approach the AICC leadership against Tharoor’s latest remarks instead of reacting himself.

“When elections get closer, certain leaders come out with all sorts of claims on who is the apt CM candidate. There’s a system in the Congress party to identify the CM candidate,” party veteran Ramesh Chennithala said.

K. Muraleedharan, another senior leader, was the most forthright, saying: “After reading the article, I’m wondering whether he is still in the Congress or a loyalist of the BJP.”

He added: “The CM candidate will be someone who’s working 24 hours in Kerala. Tharoor is a global citizen, we require someone who is well-versed with the state. Let Tharoor look after global affairs and we will look after the state.”

Tharoor balanced his attack on the Emergency by mentioning the undemocratic tendencies of the present-day rulers.

“The most pertinent in our current political climate — is that an overweening executive, backed by a legislative majority, can pose a grave danger to democracy, especially when that executive is convinced of its own infallibility and impatient with the checks and balances that are essential to democratic systems,” Tharoor wrote.

“The temptation to centralise power, to silence critics, and to bypass constitutional safeguards can emerge in many forms, often cloaked in the rhetoric of national interest or stability.”

Tharoor is scheduled to return to Kerala on July 18 after completing the overseas “diplomatic mission” assigned to him by the BJP government to convey India’s standagainst terrorism.

A senior Congress leader told The Telegraph that if Tharoor was angling fora show-cause notice so he could acquire a martyr’s halo, the party was not keen on obliging him.