Shashi Tharoor Quotes

• India is not, as people keep calling it, an underdeveloped country, but rather, in the context of its history and cultural heritage, a highly developed one in an advanced state of decay.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Country, People, History

  Shashi Tharoor (2005). “Bookless In Baghdad”, p.27, Penguin Books India

  83 Copy quote

• There is not a thing as the wrong place, or the wrong time. We are where we are at the only time we have. Perhaps it's where we're meant to be.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Wrong Time, Only Time, Meant To Be

  26 Copy quote

• A philosopher is a lover of wisdom, not of knowledge, which for all its great uses ultimately suffers from the crippling effect of ephemerality. All knowledge is transient, linked to the world around it and subject to change as the world changes, whereas wisdom, true wisdom is eternal, immutable. To be philosophical one must love wisdom for its own sake, accept its permanent validity and yet its perpetual irrelevance. It is the fate of the wise to understand the process of history and yet never to shape it.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Wise, Philosophical, Fate

  "The Great Indian Novel". Book by Shashi Tharoor, August 24, 1989.

  37 Copy quote

• India has been born and reborn scores of times, and it will be reborn again. India is forever, and India is forever being made.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Forever, India, Born

  Shashi Tharoor (1993). “The Great Indian Novel”, p.245, Arcade Publishing

  29 Copy quote

• It's not the side of the bigger army that wins. It's the country that tells a better story.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Country, Army, Winning

  19 Copy quote

• If you believe in truth and cared enough to obtain it, you had to be prepared actively to suffer for it.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Believe, Suffering, Enough

  Shashi Tharoor (1993). “The Great Indian Novel”, p.48, Arcade Publishing

  16 Copy quote

• If America is a melting pot, then to me India is a thali--a selection of sumptuous dishes in different bowls. Each tastes different, and does not necessarily mix with the next but they belong together on the same plate, and they complement each other in making the meal a satisfying repast.

  Shashi Tharoor

  America, Together, Different

  Shashi Tharoor (2007). “The Elephant, the Tiger, and the Cell Phone: Reflections on India, the Emerging 21st-century Power”, p.62, Penguin Books India

  23 Copy quote

• Freedom of the press is the mortar that binds together the bricks of democracy -- and it is also the open window embedded in those bricks.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Together, Democracy, Bricks

  Speech at the UN's World Press Freedom Day, May 3, 2001.

  25 Copy quote

• On Gandhi: Don’t ever forget, that we were not lead by a saint with his head in clouds, but by a master tactician with his feet on the ground.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Clouds, Feet, Saint

  "The Great Indian Novel". Book by Shashi Tharoor, August 24, 1989.

  24 Copy quote

• Hindu fundamentalism is a contradiction in terms, since Hinduism is a religion without fundamentals; there is no such thing as a Hindu heresy. How dare a bunch of goondas shrink the soaring majesty of the Vedas and the Upanishads to the petty bigotry of their brand of identity politics?

  Shashi Tharoor

  Identity Politics, Vedas, Fundamentals

  Shashi Tharoor (2007). “The Elephant, the Tiger, and the Cell Phone: Reflections on India, the Emerging 21st-century Power”, p.75, Penguin Books India

  25 Copy quote

• Western dictionaries define secularism as absence of religion but Indian secularism does not mean irreligiousness.It means profusion of religions.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Mean, Doe, Absence

  103 Copy quote

• India shaped my mind, anchored my identity, influenced my beliefs, and made me who I am. ... India matters to me and I would like to matter to India.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Who I Am, Mind, Identity

  Shashi Tharoor (2005). “Bookless In Baghdad”, p.39, Penguin Books India

  15 Copy quote

• Diplomacy is much like the "lovemaking of elephants", which is accompanied with a lot of bellowing and other sound effects, but no one can be sure of the consequences for at least the next two years

  Shashi Tharoor

  Years, Elephants, Two

  17 Copy quote

• In India we celebrate the commonality of major differences; we are a land of belonging rather than of blood.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Blood, Land, Differences

  Shashi Tharoor (2005). “Bookless In Baghdad”, p.102, Penguin Books India

  12 Copy quote

• No one says "Gee Whiz!" very much these days, of course, not even in America - both because that expression has long since been supplanted by others more colourful and less printable, and because our capacity for surprise has long since been dulled by a surfeit of sources.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Expression, America, Long

  14 Copy quote

• The only possible idea of India is that of a nation greater than the sum of its parts.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Ideas, India, Greater

  Shashi Tharoor (2007). “The Elephant, the Tiger, and the Cell Phone: Reflections on India, the Emerging 21st-century Power”, p.113, Penguin Books India

  12 Copy quote

• Resolutions aren't self-executing. Somebody has to provide the soldiers, take the risks, risk their blood and their treasure to go out and implement such a resolution.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Self, Blood, Soldier

  Source: globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com

  14 Copy quote

• Terrorism is a principal preoccupation in most of our international contacts.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Terrorism, Preoccupation, Contact

  14 Copy quote

• India is more than a sum of its contradictions, any truism about India can be contradicted with another truism. There is no fixed stereotype. But even thinking about India makes clear the immensity of the nation-building challenge.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Thinking, Challenges, India

  16 Copy quote

• I make no bones about the fact that India matters to me, and I would like to matter to India.

  Shashi Tharoor

  India, Matter, Facts

  9 Copy quote

• The British are the only people in history crass enough to have made revolutionaries out of Americans.

  Shashi Tharoor

  People, Revolutionary, Enough

  "The Great Indian Novel". Book by Shashi Tharoor, August 24, 1989.

  12 Copy quote

• This is the one international institution we have in which governments get together to work collectively for a common purpose. International crises, by definition, require international solutions. Peacekeeping is a response to conflict, is a response to situations in which often it is not the business of any one particular country to get into. It seems to me, therefore, that the world will for the foreseeable future need peacekeeping.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Country, Government, Common Purpose

  66 Copy quote

• What economic libralisation needs, if it is to succeed , is a general acceptance that reforms are for the general good, that they might seem to help some more than others, but that in the long run everyone will benefit from them. Such attitude is far from being realized

  Shashi Tharoor

  Running, Attitude, Acceptance

  10 Copy quote

• The good terrorists are the guys who bomb and kill Indians. The bad terrorists are the ones who attack Pakistani interests, whether in Afghanistan or Pakistan. In other words, you blow up the Taj Mahal Hotel, you are a good guy. You blow up the Marriott in Islamabad, you are a bad guy.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Blow, Guy, Taj Mahal

  9 Copy quote

• Im not a techno-determinist. I believe we need to improve our existing human resources, and technology can only be a complement.

  Shashi Tharoor

  Believe, Technology, Needs

  10 Copy quote

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