Are you tired of using ‘godi media’ and ‘andhbhakt’ over and over? Well, Shashi Tharoor is. And he has an ‘acceptable alternative’.
For those tired of describing people as “andhbhakts”, “godi”, “paid followers” and the like, an acceptable alternative? https://t.co/XIzxRs8Ddp
— Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) November 4, 2026
The word is ‘quockerwodger’, meaning a political puppet — a person controlled by someone else who acts on their instructions.
The Congress MP and author from Thiruvananthapuram is a well-known wordsmith in Indian politics, famous for occasionally sharing rarely used or difficult-to-pronounce words.
Tharoor had earlier shared the word ‘quockerwodger’ and its meaning, calling it the word of our era. “Word of our era! I think our ruling party has spawned a few of these in the last dozen years,” he said.
Tharoor has also taken digs at the BJP government using rarely used words such as ‘allodoxaphobia’, which he explained as an irrational fear of opinions.
In the past, he has also stumped people with words such as ‘farrago’ and ‘troglodyte’. While ‘farrago’ means a confused mixture, a ‘troglodyte’ refers to a person regarded as deliberately ignorant or old-fashioned.
In May 2022, Tharoor took a direct dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, asking: “Why does our PM play possum when heinous atrocities are committed by his worst supporters?”
To ‘play possum’ means to pretend to be unaware or feign ignorance.
Then came another pointed vocabulary lesson for the BJP government. “A word we'd better start learning in India: ANOCRACY,” Tharoor wrote.
An anocracy is a form of government that combines democratic and autocratic features — a system in which elections are held, but democratic institutions, civil liberties and checks and balances are weakened.
