Vis-a-Vis

M. VENKAIAH NAIDU senior BJP leader versus ANAND SHARMA Congress spokeperson

The new patents regime is certain to frustrate our national goal of 'health for all' as the prices of essential medicines will shoot up.

The Patents Bill had been drafted as per the BJP's own papers and files after meetings and discussions. Its opposition is politically motivated.

EPILOGUE: With the new Patents Bill evoking uncertainties, the onus is on the common man.

VOICES

"Instead of zero hour, it has become torture hour."

Somnath Chatterjee, Lok Sabha Speaker,
aggrieved at the conduct of MPs in Parliament

"What we could not achieve in 1947 militarily has been achieved politically and in a very friendly manner."

Lt-General (retd) S.K. Sinha, Jammu and Kashmir governor,
on the decision to open the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road

"Frankly, I can live without TV but not without newspapers."

S. Jaipal Reddy, Union minister for information and broadcasting

"I have to score runs, that's the foremost thing. Captaincy is not on my mind."

Sourav Ganguly, Indian cricket captain,
after Pakistan won the Bangalore Test

"I have never believed in formulae since they never work. Just as you would get bored of eating the same dish every day, a viewer too gets fed up of watching the same kind of cinema."

Kamal Haasan, actor and filmmaker

THE BUZZ OF THE WEEK

Stung by the BJP's criticism of being an "invisible PM", Manmohan Singh has decided to reduce foreign trips and focus on domestic issues. An official conference in Indonesia is the first casualty.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM RSS chief K.S. Sudarshan's revelation last week to India Today that senior Congress leader Vayalar Ravi had sought the RSS' votes to defeat the communists in the 2001 Kerala assembly polls has caused a serious flutter in the faction-ridden Congress and ruling United Democratic Front (UDF). Sudarshan said while the RSS had told the BJP to oblige then no understanding happened during the Lok Sabha polls last year, leading to a Left victory. However, Ravi has denied meeting Sudarshan or going to the RSS headquarters. "I think there is a conspiracy behind the allegation," says Ravi, with the state PCC fully endorsing his stand.

PICTURE SPEAK

IN DENIAL MODE: Ravi (right) and Sudarshan

But Kerala's BJP leaders say Ravi had sought their votes, especially in Kottayam, where his wife Mercy had contested. While the charges have come handy for Ravi's arch rivals-former chief minister K. Karunakaran and his son K. Muralidharan-who have called for a probe into the allegation, UDF ally Muslim League is also seeking explanations. The controversy couldn't have come at a worse time for the ruling Congress.

-By M.G. Radhakrishnan

DELHI While the constant recitation of the K-word by Pervez Musharraf may have led to India having second thoughts about a substantive meeting with the Pakistan President when he arrives in India to watch the one-day match in Delhi in mid-April, it didn't deter the two sides from encouraging political contacts. So the former Pakistan prime minister and president of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League Chaudhary Shujat Hussain was here on the invitation of Congress President Sonia Gandhi. Hussain who met President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is a veteran in Pakistan politics and his party provides the democratic label to the general's military regime. While his visit did not have any significant agenda, it conveyed that times are changing for bilateral ties.

-By Saurabh Shukla

RECEIVED: The OBC-WildWings Conservation Awareness Award for 2004, by The Last Flight, a film by Nutan Manmohan, on the vanishing vultures of
South Asia.

DIED: Nemichandra Jain, 86, theatre personality and writer. The Padma Shri awardee also founded Natrang Prathishtan, a theatre organisation, and edited a Hindi theatre quarterly Natrang, besides academic stints at the Centre for Cultivation of Arts, JNU, and the National School of Drama.

DIED: R.R. Daniel, 81, scientist and founder member of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai. He was a recipient of the Padma Bhushan.

BANNED: Kanwalpreet Singh, Punjab Police defender, by the Indian Hockey Federation, for two years, for beating up a national squad player during a domestic competition last month.

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