|
Ticket to Ride Delhi:
RJD chief Laloo Prasad Yadav may still be the king of Patna but in Delhi he has to go by
the rules. Following his much-publicised ride back home on an elephant after his release
from Beur Central Jail last week, the former Bihar chief minister attempted an encore in
Delhi. He ordered his minions to keep a pachyderm ready to welcome him at the airport. But
the Bihar officials prevailed upon him, saying it would be impossible to get permission to
ride through the busy Delhi traffic. Not to be denied his moment of triumph, Laloo honked
his way from the airport in a cavalcade of cars. When asked whether his clout in the
capital had waned, the beleaguered protagonist of the fodder scam was at his sarcastic
best: "One may need permission to ride on Delhi's roads, but wait and see, I'll make
a come back soon."
Back in Circulation
Delhi: Vasant
Sathe, one-time I&B minister and veteran Gandhi-family loyalist, has been taken out
from the mothballs and made chairman of the editorial board of Congress Sandesh, the
party's journal. Never one without ideas, Sathe has grand plans for his newspaper and
wants to run it on "commercial lines". As the prerequisite for this is a stable
readership, Sathe got the AICC to order every active member to subscribe to the Sandesh.
Planned as a trilingual (English, Hindi, Urdu), the Sandesh will thus have a captive
readership of 10 lakh. Each member will have to shell out Rs 25 annually for 12 issues.
This will mean an immediate corpus of Rs 2.5 crore. Besides, Sathe plans to seek
advertisements from business houses for what will be "one of the largest circulated
publications in the country". Of course, editorial content as well as the ads will be
in consonance with "party values". Which means: articles on patriotism and
ethics in national life, and no liquor ads.
Another Applause
Hyderabad:
Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu is used to being showered with praises for what he has
done to Andhra Pradesh. But what gladdens him most are laudatory comments from the
opposition Congress. The latest pat on his back came from senior Congress leader Sharad
Pawar during the World Marathi Conference in the city. All this, of course, has upset the
state Congress leaders, peeved as they were with Pawar accepting Naidu's breakfast
invitation. Pawar's visit came barely a week after they had managed to stall Madhya
Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijay Singh's visit to the state. Now they are hoping that party
chief Sonia Gandhi puts an end to the "Naidu-patting".
Cash Traps
Chandigarh:
First it was father Parkash Singh Badal, Punjab chief minister, who came up with a reward
scheme to stem corruption in the government. Now it's the turn of son Sukhbir, Union
minister of state for industry, who has decided to counter charges of pampering his
constituency Faridkot. Faced with opposition allegations about money changing hands in the
"transfers and postings business", Sukhbir has announced a cash reward of Rs 1
lakh to anyone proving the charges. Though his offer is an improvement on papa's Rs 25,000
reward booty, Badal Jr has not made clear where the money for his "publicity
stunt" is to come from: his own pockets or the precariously placed state exchequer. |
