evidence: Here is exactly what Tharoor said - "... and this personality cult has not sat very well with many in the RSS establishment. There's an extraordinarily striking metaphor expressed by an unnamed RSS source to journalist Vinod Jose of The Caravan which I quote here, in which they express their frustration with their inability to curb Mr Modi. And the man says, "Mr Modi," he says, "is like a scorpion sitting on a Shivling; you cannot remove him with your hand, and you cannot hit him with a chappal either." And if you think about it, that's a very very profound understanding of the relationship. Because if you remove a scorpion with your hand you will get stung very badly, but if you hit a Shivling with a chappal, then you have undermined all the sacred tenets of the faith that you hold in that the scorpion is sitting on. So, ultimately, you live with it with seething frustration. That may well be a very interesting clue to the rather complex dynamics that exist between the Hindutva movement and the Moditva expression of it." [...] It is clear that Shashi Tharoor did not say he would attack a "Shivling" with a "chappal" and that he only quoted a line from an article published in 2012.