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Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has criticised the deportation of London-based Hindi scholar Francesca Orsini, saying the government must develop “a thicker skin, a broader mind, and a bigger heart” in dealing with academics. The Thiruvananthapuram MP said India’s reputation suffers more from such actions than from any criticism published in international academic circles. “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 any number of negative articles in foreign academic journals could ever accomplish,” Tharoor wrote on X (formerly Twitter). 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 His comments came in response to a post by former BJP MP Swapan Dasgupta, who shared his newspaper column titled “Orsini Furore Shows Perils of Visa Vigilantes.” Dasgupta wrote that while the state has the right to ensure compliance with visa rules, it has “no business to assess the scholarship of a professor.” Orsini, a Hindi scholar and professor emerita at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), was deported from Delhi airport last month after arriving from Hong Kong. Government sources said she had been placed on a blacklist in March 2025 for allegedly violating visa conditions. The Congress party earlier condemned the move, calling it “a symptom of the Modi government’s hostility towards independent and professional scholarship.” Historian Ramachandra Guha also criticised the deportation, calling it “the mark of a government that is insecure, paranoid, and even stupid.” He described Orsini as a distinguished academic “whose work has richly illuminated our understanding of India’s cultural heritage.”
