EYEING THE BACKWARD VOTE: Sachin Pilot

Jaipur: In the Congress, the new millennium has been a time for renewing legacies. The late MP Rajesh Pilot's 24-year-old son Sachin joined politics at a kisan rally in Jaipur in early February. And he's been received with enthusiasm. With the crowd cheering his speech and Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot in attendance, state Congress President Girija Vyas took the hint and declared she was admitting Sachin into the party.
The party honoured Sachin in order to get the backward Gujjar vote that it has been losing to the bjp since Pilot's death in June 2000. Though Pilot's widow Rama donned his mantle and won the Dausa Lok Sabha by-poll that year, she could not help the Congress retain the Hindoli assembly seat she had vacated in January 2001.

Will the junior Pilot be able to rework his father's magic? Only time will tell. Sachin says he shares a special bond with his father's constituency, but won't the Wharton Business School graduate stick out in India's grimy political scene? Not according to him. "In future, a lot of issues are going to revolve around economics," he says. For the moment, he runs a trendy coffee shop in Delhi with sister Sarika. Now that he's joined up, will Rama hang up her boots? "I'm not old enough to retire," the mother counters.

-Lakshmi Iyer

GOLDEN PUMPKIN

THE GREAT PRETENDER: Musharraf

General Pervez Musharraf is the world's ultimate infotech man-he lives in virtual reality. When in America, he decided journalist Daniel Pearl was alive and well and "victim" of a fundamentalist conspiracy against Musharraf! Hours later, Omar Saeed Sheikh, mastermind of Pearl's abduction, was telling a Pakistani court the American was dead. The judge-he must be a cousin of Musharraf-pretended not to hear. For the rest of the week, Musharraf and his government heard nothing at all, even while Pakistani newspapers reported Sheikh had admitted guilt for the hijacking of the Indian Airlines plane in December 1999 and the attack on Parliament in December 2001.

On his part, Musharraf kept to his "look I'm so good" act. At a public function, he chided cricketer Imran Khan-famous for his Anglo-Lahori drawl-for asking him to speak in Urdu. He was proud of his English, the General said, and would help Pakistanis teach it to the Chinese to make them better it professionals. It's the sort of reasoning they specialise in in Musharraf's cute little madarsas.

SIGNPOSTS

APPOINTED: Hardeep Puri, as India's permanent representative to the UN in Geneva. He was earlier deputy high commissioner to the UK.

DIED: Charles Stephen, 71, 1956 Melbourne Olympics hockey gold-medal winner.: An honorary fellowship, to President K.R. Narayanan, by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow.

APPOINTED: G.N. Bajpai, as chairman of sebi. He was earlier chairman of lic.

MOVED: Home Minister L.K. Advani, to new home at 30 Prithviraj Road, Delhi, for security reasons.

CHOSEN: Novelist Bhisham Sahni and poets Kaifi Azmi and Nilmani Phokan as Fellows of the Sahitya Akademi