‘Snollygoster’: Shashi Tharoor’s ‘Word Of The Day’ On Nitish Kumar’s Volte-Face

Shashi Tharoor, a prolific author and a man of many letters, known for throwing obscure English words into the social media lexicon, has used snollygoster earlier as well.

Congress veteran Shashi Tharoor on Sunday took a dig at Nitish Kumar over the latter’s latest flip-flop after the JD(U) leader snapped ties with the Mahagathbandhan government in Bihar and once again returned to the BJP-led NDA fold. Tharoor, who is famous for his uncanny command over the English language, dubbed Kumar as a “snollygoster”, which means a shrewd, unprincipled politician.

Sharing his old post from 2017 when Kumar had severed ties with Bihar’s Mahagathbandhan and aligned with the BJP despite his long-standing rivalry with the saffron brigade, Tharoor wrote on X:”<sigh!> Didn’t realise it would be the Word of Another Day too!#snollygoster”.

Tharoor, however, did not name Kumar.

“Word of the day! Definition of *snollygoster* US dialect: a shrewd, unprincipled politician. First Known Use: 1845. Most recent use: 26/7/17,” the former Union minister had tweeted in 2017.

The Congress MP, who is a prolific author and a man of many letters, known for throwing obscure English words into the social media lexicon, has used snollygoster earlier as well.

In 2017, he had tweeted the word in an apparent reference to Kumar switching sides to the BJP. He did so again in 2019 when BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis was sworn in as chief minister of Maharashtra with Nationalist Congress Party’s Ajit Pawar seemingly switching over to support a BJP-led government.

In November 2022, Tharoor took a swipe at party-hopping politicians in India by posting a video of a chameleon changing shades as it climbs a colour-banded pole and threw in the rarely used word snollygoster.

His sharp-witted jibe had then come in the backdrop of several politicians switching sides ahead of the Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat assembly polls.

‘Like a chameleon’

The Congress on Sunday compared Bihar Kumar to a “chameleon”, and said the people of the state will never forgive him for his “betrayal”.

The party was reacting to Kumar’s decision to resign as Bihar chief minister and leaving the Mahagathbandhan alliance in the state and also dealing a body blow to the opposition bloc INDIA.

(With PTI inputs)