I am unfazed by the 'outsider' tag: Tharoor

Unfazed by the 'outsider' tag, Shashi Tharoor, who will start a new innings by contesting the Lok Sabha polls after a long stint with the United Nations, says he is confident of rallying support by bringing "different" vision and experiences onto the political stage.

Tharoor, 53, who has been given a Congress ticket from Thiruvananthapuram, said, "I accept that the local people may feel that their hard work is being bypassed in favour of somebody from the outside."

"Concerning this my only answer truly can be that if you look at the overall national picture one needs a balance. One needs people who indeed are absolutely from the very soil that they are representing. And, one needs people who bring a different vision to that overall shape of the electorate is represented though different kinds of vision," Tharoor, who has also authored many books, told NDTV.

He was questioned about his new role and the charge that most of his recent life he had lived in New York and "knew Manhattan more than Thiruvananthapuram".

Tharoor started working with the UN in 1978 and resigned from the post of Under Secretary General in February 2007. Backed by India, he unsuccessfully contested for the post of the UN Secretary General in 2006.

"It seems to me that those who may have been disappointed that I have been given this nomination have every right to be disappointed," Tharoor said about the Lok Sabha ticket.

But the former diplomat said he had spoken to "many of the legitimate aspirants, they too have rallied around saying we are happy to have you because after all I too am making an effort to get to know them and their problems, bringing my experiences which are very different, onto the political stage as well".