Snippets / Mail Today, June 14, 2010

Modi not welcome in Bihar

THE BJP, which tried to score a point by holding its national executive ( NE) in Patna last weekend, seems to have ended up scoring a self- goal. The battle of political wits that began in Patna last weekend between chief minister Nitish Kumar and his Gujarat counterpart Narendra Modi triggered events that could end up in a messy divorce between the JD( U) and the BJP, who are in coalition in the state that is up for polls.

So far, Nitish has done a fine balancing act as a secularist who finds nothing wrong in sharing power with the BJP. It may be recalled that during the last Lok Sabha elections, he campaigned for BJP candidates but made sure the minorities weren’t lost by keeping Modi away from poll platforms.

With Modi arriving in Patna for the NE, the expected and much worse has happened.

A public rally scheduled under the NDA banner with senior leaders such as L. K. Advani, Nitin Gadkari, Narendra Modi along with the fiery Varun participating ultimately became a BJP rally after Nitish refused to share the stage with Modi.

A dinner that Nitish had planned at his residence for all NE members was cancelled after Nitish made known his distaste for supping with Modi.

But the unseemly row touched a new low when Nitish objected to ads that the Gujarat government had taken out in Patna papers which had pictures of Modi and Nitish together and extolled the generous grants the Gujarat government had provided to Bihar after the 2008 Kosi floods. So offended was Nitish that he called it “ uncivilised” and threatened legal action against those behind the ad. He also said Bihar would return the money the Modi government had given.
The JD( U)- BJP alliance has been under strain for long.

And my instinct tells me it will not last long. Sooner or later, the BJP will decide to go on its own, knowing that in a polarised polity, Nitish will have to vie with Lalu Prasad and the Congress for the minority and backward votes while hoping to cash in on the rest.

Congress ambiguity on the caste census

EVEN four weeks after the Prime Minister announced the decision to appoint an Empowered Group of Ministers to discuss and resolve the conflicts stemming from the decision to hold the controversial caste- based census, Manmohan Singh seems to be in no particular hurry to honour his pledge. Ever since he said in Parliament that his government will give the idea serious thought, he has been under immense pressure from civil society leaders as well as large numbers of young MPs to keep the decision on hold. Even during the past few cabinet meetings, the idea was opposed by few senior ministers.

The opposition within the council of ministers, however, came into the open only when minister of state for home affairs Ajay Maken wrote a letter to all young MPs cutting across party divisions, asking them to oppose the move. It was his contention that a caste- based headcount will trigger another aggressive and divisive agitation for enhancing reservations in government jobs and educational institutions, leaving the upper castes and even the meritorious among the poor with nothing but crumbs. The Prime Minister’s promise to take a serious look at the demand for a caste- based census was made merely to placate the powerful Yadav duo in return for their support to get cut motions moved by the BJP and the CPI( M) on the finance bill defeated.

Bizarrely, he did so just a few hours after home minister P. Chidambaram told Parliament about the inherent difficulties and dangers of holding such a census. It now appears that with the cut motion now out of the way, the government is having second thoughts and there are rumours that it was the party leadership that encouraged its Gen Next MPs to speak up. Now, with the massive divisions within the BJP also coming into the open, Gen Next seems to have won round one in dictating the political agenda.

GOPALKRISHNA Gandhi’s C. V. could make anyone turn green with envy. An IAS officer of the Tamil Nadu cadre, he served as secretary to the President, director of the Nehru Centre in London and as India’s envoy to Norway, Iceland, Sri Lanka, South Africa and other countries, and also had a five- year stint as governor. He is also the grandson of C. Rajagopalachari and Mahatma Gandhi.

At the age of 65, you’d expect him to look back in satisfaction at a long and distinguished innings and spend a quiet life in Chennai. But is the former governor — among the most activist that any Raj Bhavan has seen — missing the trappings of the gubernatorial mansion? His backers are doing the rounds in Delhi seeking another stint as governor for him, preferably in the Raj Bhavan in Panaji, Goa.

Gandhi has enough powerful backers in the government, yet there are hurdles.

The current incumbent in Goa is S. S. Sidhu, who is known to be close to the Gandhi family from the mid 1980s when he was the secretary in the civil aviation ministry and pilot- turnedpolitician Rajiv was the Prime Minister.

Power & Politics / Mail Today, June 14, 2010

THERE is a raging existential crisis in the Congress that threatens to cripple the government and the party. UPA ministers feuding openly at cabinet meetings are now passé; now the government and the party that’s leading it are at war and it’s an ideological war. One thinks global, talks about FDI, wants greater economic interaction with the West, is grateful for Barack Obama’s occasional kind words and gloats over strategic initiatives with the United States. The other thinks local, its leaders talk of aam aadmi , routinely visit jhuggi jhopris and never take their eyes off the next elections. Digvijay Singh is among the seniormost Congress leaders.
Far from being a loose cannon, he is among the most responsible Congressmen. Yet, he has said and done enough in the last two months to show up the glaring differences in the ruling establishment.

Two months ago, he embarrassed the government by publicly slamming P. Chidambaram for the home ministry’s policy on handling Maoist extremism. Now, Diggyraja has gone and done it again, this time over the Bhopal gas leak tragedy. His statement that Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson was allowed to go scot free under pressure from the US has once again embarrassed the government and underscores the depth of the divide. The frequent salvos from Digvijay — never mind if once in a while he retracts his statements — are signs of two wings of an establishment pulling in opposite directions. One that wants development at any cost and the other that believes in the Congress of old times — left of centre.

After the massacre of CRPF jawans in Dantewada, Chidambaram talked tough but was met with scathing criticism from large sections of the party. Surface transport minister Kamal Nath is in a hurry to acquire land for roads but environment minister Jairam Ramesh wants the impact on local habitats to be assessed before clearance is given.

The same Jairam had embarrassed the government by attacking the home ministry while on an official visit to China. He was duly censured by the Prime Minister and there was even speculation over his continuation in the ministry as rumours did the rounds that he would be denied a renomination to the Rajya Sabha. His re- entry into the Upper House last week, which could not have come about without clearance from the highest party levels is, if anything, proof that for all the admonitions, he continues to have the full backing of the few who matter in the party.

Last week, the newly reconstituted National Advisory Council with Sonia Gandhi as chairperson held its first meeting. Readers will recall that the NAC was set up weeks after the UPAI took office and, before it became defunct in 2006, had played a key role in the enactment of two of the government’s showpiece achievements — the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and the Right to Information Act.

In its first avatar, there were charges that the NAC was being some sort of a “ Super Cabinet” but the government was quick to deny these. The charges are likely to resurface now after the NAC, at its meeting last Thursday, made known its displeasure over the implementation of flagship schemes.

The members are said to have insisted on scrutinising the progress of the programmes. One even pointed to the incongruity of the government pushing the Nuclear Liability Bill at a time when the nation is reeling in horror at the Bhopal gas tragedy verdict.

Everyone seems to have taken positions, but the two who must are holding their cards close to their chest. So far, neither Sonia Gandhi nor her son has said anything of significance on the Naxalite menace, terrorism, the economy or foreign relations. Their motto seems to be: talk less, work more. So Rahul spends nights in the interiors, sharing dal- roti with impoverished villagers in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, Sonia’s helicopter makes day trips to similar locales in other parts of the country. Both mother and son ignore the bitter recriminations in the UPA cabinet and carry on with their work, knowing that issues such as the Nuclear Liability Bill or increased FDI have nothing to do with getting votes.

The first test of this strategy will be the elections next year in states such as West Bengal and Kerala, where the Left has already ceded space. If they succeed, by the time Rahul’s coronation comes up in 2014, it will be a different Congress that marches to the polls. And many of the ministers now strutting around will have no place in Rahul’s team.

Seedhi Baat / Aajtak, June 13, 2010

'Bhopal tragedy not a conspiracy'

Former Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh says on Seedhi Baat that the Bhopal gas tragedy happened because of carelessness on part of the Union Carbide management and the administration but was not a conspiracy.

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Snippets / Mail Today, June 07, 2010

An unlikely saviour for Jharkhand

THERE are governors and governors. Some are like N. D. Tiwari, the former occupant of the Hyderabad Raj Bhavan. Like moths drawn to light, they are drawn to controversy and meet with an unceremonious end. In Tiwari’s case, he was caught by hidden cameras having a romp in the gubernatorial bed with two masseuses and was shown the exit door.

Then there are others like MOH Farook. Of the 30 governors across the country, the Jharkhand governor is the least controversial although he presides over a state which has had a surfeit of political controversies in recent times. Two of his predecessors, Prabhat Kumar and Syed Sibtey Razi were summarily sacked after they got embroiled in the state’s murky politics. Farook took over as governor just after Shibu Soren became chief minister last December and politics in the state has slipped from the gutter to the sewer level since then. Farook must count his blessings for having lasted so long without a smear to his name.

It was bad enough working with a maverick like Shibu Soren. But now that the state is under president’s rule, Farook is the de facto chief and considering the mess that Soren and his team have left behind, he has got his hands full. As a three term chief minister of Pondicherry— the first as early as 1967— he won’t be found wanting in experience. He is determined to use his time as administrator to order a clean up. His first move is to hold Panchayat elections, which have never been held since the state’s formation ten years ago, this September. He has also made the Ranchi Raj Bhavan open house on Mondays for people to bring their grievances directly to him while Wednesdays are reserved for meetings with state secretaries.

Last week, he did the rounds of Delhi, meeting Manmohan Singh, Sonia Gandhi and home minister P. Chidambaram and armed with their thumbs up, is getting down to business. For the sake of that blighted state, more power to his elbows.

Election jackpot for automobile companies

IN THE old days, India’s only jeep manufacturer and the handful of light motor vehicle makers used to dread elections. That is when political parties flexed their muscles and virtually hijacked hundreds of brand new vehicles from their yards for use in the campaign. These were of course returned to the companies after the polls, but in a condition that no buyer would want to risk buying it.

Times have changed and with all political parties now flush with funds, vehicle manufacturers actually look forward to elections these days. Sales are brisk and with supply unable to keep up with demand, they are even charging premiums for early delivery.

Assembly elections are due in Bihar later this year and a windfall awaits the handful of SUV manufacturers in the country. More than a hundred candidates — independents and those from mainline parties — have ordered bullet proof SUVs that cost anything between Rs 20 lakh and Rs 40 lakh each from the manufacturers.

Many more have purchased the vehicles and handed them over to enterprising tin- shed entrepreneurs who flourish in parts of eastern Uttar Pradesh to customise the vehicles according to individual needs. Admitted, several districts in Bihar are Maoist affected and candidates need all the protection that they can afford. But the irony here is that most of the candidates are buying the fortified vehicles not out of fear of threats from extremists but from their own political opponents.

Until now, only the chief minister, some members of his cabinet and senior secretaries were accorded bullet proof convoys, but at the rate at which orders are going out for these vehicles, I reckon that up to 300 candidates will be going around campaigning in bullet proof vehicles with security cover being given by their own private armies. It’s a sad comment on the level of politics being practised in the world’s largest democracy.

IN OVER three decades that I have covered politics and government, I have found K. M. Chandrashekhar to be the most proactive cabinet secretary. I have in the past written about and lauded the many initiatives that he had taken to make the bureaucracy more responsive and in tune with the changing times. Last week, his term was extended by another year and you will be wrong if you think it was done for the good job he has been doing. In one stroke, the government has effectively put an end to all hopes that at least three senior secretaries— Ashok Chawla of finance, urban development secretary M. Ramachandran and P. J. Thomas of telecom — had of becoming the chief of the country’s civil services. For long, rumours had been swirling that the government would go to any extent to appoint Pulok Chatterjee, a 1974 batch officer currently with the World Bank in Washington, as the CabSec. Chatterjee, for the uninitiated, is a 10 Janpath loyalist who worked in the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and in the early years of the UPA was in the Prime Minister’s Office, serving as a link between the PMO and 10 Janpath. His elevation now would have involved the supersession of half a dozen officers of the 1973 batch.

By giving Chandrashekhar another extension, the government has got around this little inconvenience.

Power & Politics / Mail Today, June 07, 2010

LATER this month, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will leave behind spiralling prices, the Maoist menace, feuding cabinet ministers, Mamata’s tantrums and other niggling issues and head for Toronto, the Canadian financial capital to attend the G- 20 summit. It will be his 47th foreign tour since he first took office in May 2004 and his 12th in the first year of UPA II. With the impending trip, Manmohan will be on course to win the frequent flier award for being India’s most travelled prime minister in the last quarter century, outstripping the 46 official trips that Rajiv Gandhi made during his tenure as Prime Minister between December 1984 and December 1989.
Rajiv was young— just 40— when he set out to sell a new vision of India to the world and was a frontline participant, particularly at nuclear disarmament summits.

Since then, the Berlin Wall has collapsed, the world has changed a lot and today international summits are dominated by the likes of G- 20, G- 8, ASEAN, et al. Those who keep a regular tab on these would have noticed that Manmohan has been a regular fixture at all such high tables. He made 35 tours in his first tenure, averaging one every six and half weeks. But the frequency has picked up in his second tenure where he’s already averaged a trip every four weeks. Manmohan’s fondness for being constantly on the move is understandable. Opponents at home may accuse him of being a puppet in the hands of the party’s power centre, but on the world stage, he has been hailed as a visionary and a man who is in total control.

In fact, at the last G20 summit in Pittsburgh in the United States held at a time when the world economy was faced with its greatest challenge in more than a generation, President Barack Obama had singled out Manmohan as “ a wonderful man and a visionary who has done a tremendous job of guiding India along the path of extraordinary economic growth”. Other leaders have been no less fulsome in their praise for the prime minister who is so much in demand to address international gatherings that he is forced to send regret notes to almost half a dozen invitations every month. When he finally lays down office, we know that there is an alternative career awaiting him like so many former heads of governments.

Is it any wonder then that Manmohan would rather be somewhere in cooler climes abroad where he is the recipient of such abundant and effusive praise rather than at home where he is pilloried day in and day out by opponents whose knowledge of economics is at best fleeting? In any case, Manmohan doesn’t have much of a political role to play at home.

He finds domestic politics as complicated as some of the dyed- in- the- wool politicians would find economics, which is Manmohan’s strongpoint. On the political front, the Congress party is run from 10 Janpath. At the government level, the Union cabinet is on auto pilot with not just ministers from alliance partners but even those from the Congress taking their own decisions on all matters relating to their departments without as much as consulting the PMO. Manmohan would have loved to dabble in the finance ministry, but with Pranabda, under whom he served in the ministry more than 25 years ago, heading it once again, the prime minister doesn’t have much of a role to play there either. In fact, it is just as well that Manmohan appointed a low profile, nonassertive person like S. M. Krishna as the minister of external affairs. It gives him the space he needs to operate on the international arena.

If the latter years of Manmohan’s first term was characterised by his obsession with selling the nuclear deal, in his second term, he appears keen to be seen as someone who had the vision, the will and the courage to shape history.

The government’s initiatives on Kashmir and the resumption of talks with Pakistan are clear pointers that Manmohan wants to leave a lasting legacy. And now he heads for Toronto, knowing fully well that with a doctorate in economics, he is more qualified than the other 19 heads of states or governments with whom he will rub shoulders, to talk about the complex subject of international finance. So despite India’s puny share of world trade, when Manmohan speaks, the world will listen. How he would wish he is listened to with the same rapt attention back home.

Seedhi Baat / Aajtak, June 06, 2010

Shivraj delayed Afzal file: Sheila

Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on the chat show Seedhi Baat says that the former home minister Shivraj Patil is responsible for delay in her reply to Parliament attack accused Afzal Guru's mercy petetion.

आजतक के खास कार्यक्रम सीधी बात में शीला दीक्षित ने इशारों ही इशारों में ये कहा कि पूर्व गृहमंत्री शिवराज पाटील ने उनसे अफजल की फाइल लटकाने को कहा था.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4