Our online poll question on expressbuzz.com today is: Is Shashi Tharoor a loose cannon?

That poser arises after his most recent gaffe – calling for Saudi Arabia as an “interlocutor” in India’s troubled ties with Pakistan, much against established Indian policy of direct talks with no mediator. In fact, India has strongly resisted bids even by the U.S. to place itself as an intermediary in its ties with Pakistan.

Tharoor cuts a sorry figure in diplomacy not because he articulated what might be an out-of-the-box approach to resolve ties with Pakistan. That would, perhaps, be acceptable to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who appears keen to explore new ways to deal with Pakistan. The veteran U.N. diplomat appears hapless because of his attempts to deny, or explain, his mouthings.

First, it was the remark characterizing Nehru’s foreign policy as “moralistic commentary.” He went to war against three newspapers for that, blaming them for what he called “inaccurate and tendentious reporting.” But a few days later, The Hindu, in an article, said “Tharoor summarised his own Nehru book, not (Lord Bhikhu) Parekh’s views.” Tharoor had used the exact same term in a previously published book, the report said suggesting his angry response was far from genuine, and clearly misplaced.

This time around, too, Tharoor went to great lengths, blaming the media’s interpretations. To do this, he split hairs on what “interlocutor” means. On Twitter, he wrote: “An interlocutor is someone you speak to. If I speak to you, you are my interlocutor. I mentioned the Saudis as our interlocutors, i.e. the people we are here to speak to.” Also read this article by V. Sudarshan in The New Indian Express titled “Tharoor bytes himself.”

Clearly, Tharoor can’t be convincing his mass following on Twitter, many apparently his admirers in the U.S. Even his fans will concede he has been trigger-happy on the micro-blogging site and rather unguarded in his public statements, to be often left ruing his lapses. On at least one occasion, he even earned a reprimand from his boss, Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna.

Tharoor’s critics might acknowledge that he may be bringing some fresh thinking, however controversial, into India’s foreign policy but why does he disown his own views in the face of political heat?