Senior Congress leaders in Kerala signalled on Sunday that the party’s patience with Shashi Tharoor, MP, was running low.

They appeared to ratchet up their criticism of Mr. Tharoor, a four-time MP from Thiruvananthapuram and a member of the Congress Working Committee, the party’s apex decision-making body, for “recurrently adopting a pro-Prime Minister Narendra Modi line” on foreign policy, national security, and also allegedly towing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) line about the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s alleged role in the “excesses” during the Emergency.

Former KPCC president K. Muraleedharan said Congress workers would boycott Mr. Tharoor and not invite him to party functions in Thiruvananthapuram. “We do not see Mr. Tharoor as one of us any more,” he added. Notably, Mr. Tharoor was reportedly not an invitee at an event organised by the All India Professionals Congress, Kerala, in Kochi last week.

Senior Congress leader Rajmohan Unnithan appeared to suggest in New Delhi that the chances of a detente with Mr. Tharoor were slim. “Mr. Tharoor is an isolated voice in the Congress. The Congress Parliamentary Party in the Lok Sabha and the high command will likely take a call on Mr. Tharoor’s recurrent deviations from the party line,” he added.

Mr. Unnithan said “no person with Congress blood in his veins” would condemn Indira Gandhi, who martyred herself for the country’s unity. “Mr. Tharoor is speaking in the voice of those who seek to destroy the Congress. Everything he is doing is bad for the party, despite having gained immensely from his association with the Congress. His intentions are clear. Mr. Tharoor is perhaps seeking new pastures using his career in the Congress as a stepping stone,” he said.

Mr. Tharoor had seemingly irked the Congress leadership further by stating that the “nation comes first” for him. Interacting with students in Kochi last week, Mr. Tharoor said he risked appearing disloyal to his party for advocating a multi-partisan approach to issues concerning national security.

“Which is your first loyalty? To my mind, the nation comes first. Some are critical of me for supporting the armed forces and the government on issues concerning India’s security. But I am standing my ground. It is imperative that political parties put their differences aside when the nation is imperilled,” Mr. Tharoor said.

He said politics was essentially about competition. But the nation came first. He quoted India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to elucidate his line on national security. “Who lives when the nation dies?” Mr. Tharoor asked.