Cover: Heroes, Villains and Zeroes of '98: P V Narasimha Rao's The Insider

If brevity was his mantra in power, verbosity marked his literary debut. The Insider was mistakenly thought to be steamy. Actually it was about two Reddys.

HEROES
Amartya Sen: The Nobel Indian
Nuclear Tests: What a Blast
Digvijay Singh: Winner Takes it All
Gallantry: Knight Service
Neemuch eye donors: A People with Vision
N Chandrababu Naidu: Hard Drive
Tata Indica: Swadeshi on Wheels
Development: Independent Action
NRI Bonds: Unlikely Harvest
Avelin Mary: Mission Possible
Asian Games: Runaway Winners
Daler Mehndi: Just Dalerious
Kuchh Kuchh Hota Hai: Picture Perfect
Sachin Tendulkar: Stroke of Genius

VILLAINS
Bal Thackeray: No.1 Yet Again
Jayalalitha: Tantrum Amma
Romesh Sharma: Fixer's Fixer
Yashwant Sinha: Rolling Back
Romesh Bhandari: Teed Off
Onion: Pungent Reminder
Sports: Politics at Play
UTI: Unfaithfully Yours
Dropsy: Death by Default
Salman Khan: Misplaced Machismo

ZEROES
Jain Commission: Who Done It?
L K Advani: Me Two
Kushabhau Thakre: Who?
Sitaram Kesri: Creature the World Forgot
Talbott-Jaswant Talks: It's the Weather, Stupid
Indo-Pak Dialogue: Dumb Charade
Amitabh Bachchan's Major Saab: Sunshine Boulevard
Sushma Swaraj: Calamity Behen
Laloo-Mulayam Entente: Thud Front
Sharad Pawar: Zero Power
I K Gujral: Bus to Pakistan

SIGNPOSTS
Ajit (1922-1998)
Protima Bedi (1948-1998)
Om Prakash (1919-1998)
Pradeep (1915-1998)
P N Haksar (1913-1998)
E M S Namboodiripad (1909-1998)
Lalita Pawar (1916-1998)
Vinod Mishra (1947-1998)
Raman Lamba (1960-1998)
Gulzarilal Nanda (1898-1998)
Persis Khambatta (1948-1998)
Laxmikant Kudalkar (1937-1998)