Congress ticket to Congress critic: Party leaves leaders stumped with Jaipur choice

However, overshadowing this was his association with The Jaipur Dialogues, which identifies itself as a “platform for the right thinking people”, and was launched in 2016 by the now retired IAS officer Sanjay Dixit.

Soon, Congress workers and supporters asked the party to reconsider its decision to field Sharma.

Party MP Shashi Tharoor said, “He must have undergone some sort of Pauline epiphany on the road to 24 Akbar! This is just one of several dozen tweets from his handle attacking me.” Tharoor quoted a tweet from the Jaipur Dialogues handle which had said that “Shashi Tharoor is just Rahul Gandhi with a thesaurus he stole from a library on his way out!”

When The Indian Express reached out to Sharma at his residence, Sharma refused to take any questions. Later, he issued a statement claiming that he parted ways with Jaipur Dialogues long ago.

“I have never had anything to do with the management of the Jaipur Dialogue YouTube channel. I am often invited on all news channels and YouTube channels as a panellist on building an inclusive India as per the Congress philosophy. In the same sequence, the Jaipur Dialogue YouTube channel had definitely invited me to speak on various social issues as per the vision of Congress and there too, as per my capacity, I have advocated the noble traditions of India and have always strongly opposed religious narrow-mindedness,” he said.

“I have long ago severed ties with the directorship of Jaipur Dialogue Forum (which has nothing to do with the ownership of YouTube) about which some people, due to their vested interests, are spreading rumours,” he claimed. However, as recently as November 2023, he was addressing sessions organised by The Jaipur Dialogues. On November 5, 2023, he was a panellist on a debate on “Digital Divide in India – AI and Civilisation.”

Through publicly available information on websites such as Zauba Corp, which collates data from official sources and third parties, Sharma is still listed as one of the five directors at The Jaipur Dialogues, having been appointed in September 2019.

As per the SGVU website, Sharma obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Commerce from Rajasthan University in 1984 and followed it up with a Degree in Law in 1987, and also has over two decades of experience as a legal consultant.

He says his family has been associated with the Congress since the 1930s and that his father was a general secretary in the Congress Socialist Party and was also lodged in jail during the freedom struggle. His brother, late Suresh Sharma, was also the Jaipur district president of Congress party and had unsuccessfully contested the Assembly election from Jaipur in the 1990s.

“My father Acharya Purushottam Uttam and my elder brother Late Suresh Sharma had devoted their entire life in the service of Congress and I too have been continuously working for the Congress Party since 1981 till now. I am a member, but it was my good fortune that during this period, I got the opportunity to serve the party while holding various posts,” Sharma said in his clarification.

As per party sources, Sharma doesn’t hold any post in the party currently but has held various posts in the past, including in the media cell and as the party’s general secretary. In 2013, he was nominated as Member of the Court of Benaras Hindu University by the President of India in his capacity as a Visitor of BHU.

In late 2013, ahead of the Assembly elections, Sharma, entrusted with the social media campaign in Rajasthan after heading the media cell for about a year, was in news for being critical of corruption and government’s performance in infrastructure, education and healthcare; both the state and Centre was ruled by Congress then.