Floccinaucinihilipilification – Sashi Tharoor just made our heads spin!

Congress leader Sashi Tharoor – Nothing activates the netizens more than the whift of vocabulary from Thiruvanthapuram MP, Sashi Tharoor.

Congress leader Sashi Tharoor stands class apart with his refined vocabulary, sometimes leaving us gasping for breath. Every time, his words strike us like an arrow and we go scratching our heads for clue. Some people have contempt towards his chest-thumping exhibition of erudition and some just animatedly read him for boosting their own vocabulary. That establishes Tharoor as Shah Rukh Khan of politics, you can love or hate him but can’t ignore him.

This time, Congress leader Sashi Tharoor was so bent upon proving his genius that he gave us the biggest word in the English dictionary so far, “Floccinaucinihilipilification”. This was probably the most searched word after Wednesday after Sashi Throor used it to describe his new book in Twitter. He has penned a new book on Narendra Modi, “The Paradoxical Prime Minister’ and to promote the book he said- ” My new book, The Paradoxical Prime Minister, is more than just a 400-page exercise in floccinaucinihilipilification (SIC),” former Under Secretary General at United Nations tweeted on Wednesday explaining about his new book on prime minister Narendra Modi.”

Soon after he dropped this bomb, his followers searched for this word in Google with a frenetic speed and asked him to re-check if it was a typo. Sashi Tharoor, without disappointing his fans told them that if the said word makes their heads spin, then they may not have heard about hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia. Well, while we tried to grasp the integrity of the word, Sashi Tharoor came to our rescue and explained the meaning of the same. “Floccinaucinihilipilification” means the action or habit of estimating something as worthless. That is quite expected from the wordsmith Tharoor and he explains that his book is just a 40 pages exercise on the Floccinaucinihilipilification.

On 10 October, while talking about his book he tweeted-  “My new book, THE PARADOXICAL PRIME MINISTER, is more than just a 400-page exercise in floccinaucinihilipilification. Pre-order it to find out why!” He further said- ” I’m sorry if one of my tweets y’day gave rise to an epidemic of hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia! [Don’t bother looking it up: it’s just a word describing a fear of long words]. But #TheParadoxicalPrimeMinister contains no words longer than Paradoxical!”

‘The Paradoxical Prime Minister’ is now available on Amazon for pre-booking and this word led his fans into wondering if they buy the book then they will get a dictionary for free too. So, we believe that what our English teachers taught us in the school were all lie. Congress MP further defended himself by saying that this is just a simple word and has no potential to become an epidemic. He also said that it is our ‘fear for words’ that is driving us bonkers over that.

Whatever be the reason, we have no shred of doubt that Tharoor has a mind, erm, unmatched vocabulary of his own.