Congress MP Shashi Tharoor stirred up some waves with his remarks on industrial growth in Kerala on Sunday. Tharoor took to 'X' (formerly Twitter) to express his disappointment about the state's startup ecosystem. He seemed to backtrack on his earlier views, claiming that Kerala needs more MSME (Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises) startups, but not just on paper.
In his post, Tharoor shared a news report from an English daily, which revealed that more than 42,000 MSMEs had shut down in Kerala over the past nine years, leading to the loss of jobs for over 1,03,000 workers.
Tharoor wrote, "Dismayed to see that the Kerala startup entrepreneurship story is not what's been reported," adding that the state's claims pointed to the right intentions, but more work needed to be done to create actual startups—not just figures on a page.
However, Tharoor's comments did not sit well with Kerala's State Industries Minister P. Rajeeve, who quickly dismissed the news report as "baseless." Rajeeve argued that he had already responded to such concerns in the Assembly on February 10
He further added that Union Commerce and Industries Minister Piyush Goyal had stated in Parliament that only 1,700 MSMEs had shut down in Kerala in the last four years, which was far fewer than what the news article suggested.
Minister also pointed out that the national average for MSME shutdowns within the first year was 30%, but in Kerala, it stood at just 15%.
Rajeeve suggested that the report had been published with a hidden agenda, mainly because it didn’t provide the source of its numbers. Still, Tharoor’s post triggered some controversy, especially within his own party. It came just days after the Congress leadership met in New Delhi to discuss strategies for next year’s Kerala Assembly polls.
Notably, Tharoor had previously written an article praising Kerala’s industrial policies under Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, which further fuelled the fire.