By Admin 
Days after London-based professor Francesca Orsini was deported from Delhi airport for alleged violation of visa conditions, senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Sunday (November 02, 2025) said that the Indian government needs to be more tolerant, broad-minded and big-hearted.
The MP from Thiruvananthapuram said showing ‘disrespectful attitude’ at the airport immigration counter to send back foreign scholars and academicians under deportation due to minor visa violations is causing more harm to the country than any negative article published in foreign academic journals.
Published article by former MP Swapan Das Gupta
Tharoor’s comment came in response to a post by former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Swapan Dasgupta, in which he shared his article published in a newspaper and argued that it is the government’s duty to ensure compliance with visa conditions, but it is not its job to evaluate the scholarship of a professor.
Dasgupta, in his article titled ‘Orsini controversy reflects the danger of visa watchdogs’, said that now that the furore over the denial of entry to Orsini, a distinguished Hindi scholar living in Britain, has subsided, it would be appropriate to consider some of the issues arising from this controversy.
Shashi Tharoor agreed to Das Gupta’s article
Tagging Dasgupta’s post, Tharoor said, ‘For once, I agree with Swapan (55). Adopting a ‘disrespectful attitude’ at the immigration counters of our airports to deport foreign scholars and academicians for minor visa violations is doing us more harm as a country, a culture and an internationally trusted nation than any negative article published in foreign academic journals.
He said, ‘The Indian government needs to be more tolerant, broad-minded and big-hearted.’ Last month, the Congress had said the decision to deport Orsini was not a matter of immigration formality but a ‘symbol of the Modi government’s hostility towards independent, serious-minded, professional scholarship’.
For once, I agree with @Swapan55,
Rolling out an “unwelcome mat“ at our airport immigration counters to deport foreign scholars and academics because of trivial visa violations is doing us far more damage — as a country, a culture and an internationally-credible nation — than… https://t.co/8bA8y8pziy
— Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) November 2, 2025
Orsini ‘blacklisted’ for violating visa conditions
A Home Ministry source said Orsini, a Hindi scholar and professor emerita at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), was deported soon after her arrival from Hong Kong last month. The source said that Orsini has been blacklisted from March 2025 due to violation of visa conditions.
Commenting on Orsini’s exile on ‘X’, historian Ramachandra Guha said, ‘Exiling him without any reason is a sign of a government that is insecure, insensitive and even stupid.’ Describing Orsini as a great scholar of Indian literature, he said that his works have richly illuminated the understanding of our own cultural heritage.
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