Yatra has done wonders, translating into votes next challenge: Tharoor

Congress leader Sashi Tharoor on Thursday said while the party's Bharat Jodo Yatra led by Rahul Gandhi has evoked a massive response, "translating this into votes is the next challenge and doesn't follow axiomatically". Tharoor, who recently unsuccessfully contested the post of Congress President, also said his party will need to take other parties, especially regional players, along to mount a challenge in the 2024 general elections.

"By own impression is that the way he (Gandhi) has been personally received has done wonders for his image," he told PTI here.

"Now translating this into votes is the next challenge, and that doesn't follow axiomatically," he added.


Questioned about Covid-19 posing a threat to the Yatra, Tharoor pointed out that the walkathon will end less than a month later on January 26 and that till now the "messages coming" from experts were fairly reassuring.

"The variants that have been doing so much damage in China have already been identified in India in June-July and have not caused any major calamity," he said while adding that the country still needed to be vigilant.

Earlier this week, the Congress had charged that the Government was using Covid as an excuse to stop the Bharat Jodo Yatra.