'Entitled to make mistakes': Sam Pitroda says Jairam Ramesh's 'assurance' post is his, not Congress' view

Sam Pitroda, reinstated as the chief of the Indian Overseas Congress, clarified that party general secretary Jairam Ramesh's claim that Pitroda assured the leadership he would avoid controversies was his "personal view, not the party's official stance".

Pitroda emphasized his right to make mistakes. "The Congress is not saying that. Jairam is saying that. What Jairam says is Jairam's view, it is not necessarily the party's view. It is okay for Jairam to say that and I respect it. I have to do what I have to do. In the process, I am entitled to make mistakes," Pitroda said in an interview to NDTV.

In a May to a newspaper, Pitroda described India as a "diverse country... where people in the East look like the Chinese, people in the West look like Arabs, people in the North look maybe White, and people in the South look like Africans." This statement, along with his comments about inheritance tax, sparked a major uproar just before the elections.

Pitroda expressed frustration that no one asked him for clarification before drawing conclusions. "When I mentioned inheritance tax, I did not mean I was proposing it. How do you come to that conclusion?" he questioned.

He also defended his comments about diversity, which some perceived as racial. "Next time I said something about how diverse we are, people thought it was racial. There is nothing racial in saying that we came from Africa. It is a fact of life. And who says that being black is racist? No. I am dark. My wife is not very dark. So what?" he said.

The controversy surrounding his comments had threatened to divert Congress from key issues like unemployment, inflation, and the broader themes of the constitution and democracy.

After he stepped down, the BJP labeled it a gimmick, with Prime Minister Modi saying it was part of the Congress's strategy to spread confusion, predicting Pitroda's return. "As PM Modi anticipated, the Congress' sacking of Sam Pitroda was merely an election gimmick. He has now been reinstated as chairman of the Indian Overseas Congress, exposing the hypocrisy of the Congress party and its leaders," the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said on X.