Congressmen are generally averse to street fighting and no one knows this better than the party leadership. So when it recently organised a protest march to Rashtrapati Bhavan against the "breakdown of the Constitution in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly", the leadership issued a three-line whip to its 170 MPs to participate in the demonstration. The whip surprised members as it is supposed to be used only to ensure attendance and voting in Parliament.

TOKEN MARCH: Sonia opted out at the last minute

The Congress leadership, it appears, had to resort to this device to make up for its measly numbers in the state Assembly. Along with the whip, party managers spread the word that Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sonia Gandhi would be leading the morcha. At the last minute, the Amethi MP changed her mind and went into a huddle with her advisers to discuss political developments in Jharkhand.

Disappointed and dispirited the MPs thereafter decided to drive the short distance between the Parliament House and Rashtrapati Bhavan.

Sonia faithfuls in the party circles explain that as a national leader she did not want to take up a state issue. But in a federal structure like India's you have to represent a state to be on the national scene, argue others.

Outside her party circuit, it is the Samajwadi Party leader, Mulayam Singh Yadav, whom Sonia has upset the most. Sonia's insouciance has ensured that the Congress downplayed his Mayawati video tape issue both inside and outside Parliament.

-Lakshmi Iyer

Shooting the Messenger

The Wayanad adivasis problem is continuing to haunt Kerala Chief Minister A.K. Antony. He had defended the police action and rejected the almost universal demand for a judicial probe. But now the media is up in arms. A case of criminal conspiracy has been filed against a TV reporter who had covered the police action. Foremost among Ramadas' crime is that he informed Opposition leaders about the casualties. Not something that convinces the watch dogs of democracy.

-M.G. Radhakrishnan

The Irons on the Fairway

Mayawati

Nobody has any doubt that Mayawati, chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, rules her state with an iron hand. Last week she visited the Planning Commission in Delhi (this being the season of allocations) and met with Deputy Chairman K.C. Pant. While she didn't intervene much during the presentation, Mayawati was forthright on issues of implementation.

This is one area where most chief ministers and even cabinet ministers throw up their hands in despair because it concerns the babudom and no political party as yet has had much luck in tackling them. But Mayawati was unfazed. In her own inimitable style, the Uttar Pradesh chief minister told Pant, "Implementation you should not worry about now that I am in control. Main kafi sakt hoon aur sakti se pesh aati hoon (I am quite tough)." As Pant and others wondered, Mayawati elaborated, "You see these officers used to take off to play golf. I have put a stop to it. Now they stand and sweat in the sun overseeing road construction." In a sense babudom is teeing off on a new driveway.

-Shankkar Aiyar

WITHDRAWN: The Indian hockey team, from the Azlan Shah Cup tournament in Malaysia, after Indian it men were harassed.

ARRESTED: DMK MP Agni Raj, for a Rs 1.47 crore fraud in a housing society he headed in 1997-2001.

AWARDED: P.P. Majumdar of the Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata, the G.D. Birla Award for his work in human genetics.

AWARDED: Aaj Tak, the silver trophy for the best media campaign at the Abby awards in Mumbai.

DIED: Flt-Lt Purshotam Lal Dhawan, 79, in Chandigarh. The World War II veteran was highly decorated for his role in the 1948 and 1962 wars.

APPOINTED: C.D. Sahay, special secretary in the cabinet secretariat, the raw chief. The IPS officer will succeed Vikram Sood.