Lucknownama

Former minister Naresh Agrawal is said to be restless these days.

Restless turncoat
Former minister Naresh Agrawal is said to be restless these days. He joined the BSP before the Lok Sabha elections last year and was straightaway made party general secretary. The BSP fielded his son,Nitin,for the Assembly bypolls from Hardoi which Agrawal had vacated and he won. Agrawal himself was fielded for the Lok Sabha election from Farrukhabad,but lost. He blamed a minister,but the party ignored the complaint. Worse still,Agrawal soon found that he may be the party general secretary,but it is the writ of the local party coordinator that runs in his home district Farrukhabad. Agrawal is a known turncoat of UP politics who had been in the Congress,Loktantrik Congress and Samajwadi Party before he joined the BSP. For someone used to power and all that goes with it,such a situation could be really painful. On top of it,the political pitch is not conducive for the kind of games in which Agrawal is a past master.

BSPs grand convention
Unlike other parties,the BSP believes in working quietly. It is planning a grand national convention on March 15 to be held at the sprawling Ramabai Ambedkar Maidan. Before the convention,a meeting of district coordinators from all states will be held. The convention is likely to conclude with a public meeting and there are plans to mobilise 20 lakh people. Behenji has planned the exercise with an eye on 2012. The idea is to send out a message that the BSP remains popular and strong,and to crank up the party machine to win the next Assembly election on its own.

Villager pulls up Cong leader
During Digvijay Singhs recent visit to Sanjarpur,Ram Naresh Yadav a senior Congress leader and former chief minister found himself in an awkward situation. Yadav hails from Azamgarh and was,therefore,accompanying the AICC general secretary and UPCC president Rita Bahuguna Joshi in his home district. On their way to the house of Saif an accused in the Batla House encounter case an elderly man stopped Yadav and asked: Why didnt you visit us all these months,you live just 20 km away? Taken aback,Yadav replied that he had tried visiting Beenapara another village from where boys have been named in terror attacks but was opposed by locals. But the questioner was persistent: Why didnt you visit Sanjarpur earlier? Why have you come now? Yadav had no reply.

A wedding with a difference
Mayor Dinesh Sharma has said that his wedding on February 16 will be a simple affair. Nevertheless,it has become a talking point for several reasons. For one,it is said that Sharma required a lot of persuasion from his family to say yes to the marriage. For another,it is an uncommon match: while the groom is a politician,the bride is a lecturer in economics at IIM,Ahmedabad. Further,the groom has decided to send the invitations only through SMS,not the traditional,ornate card. While the wedding will be held at Khatu Shyam Mandir on the banks of the Gomti,the pre-event party will be held at Colvin Taluqdars College on February 15.

Officers lobby for college chief post
The Guru Gobind Singh Sports College is without a principal-director simply because the government did not bother to find a successor to Nirmal Singh Saini before he retired on January 31. Now,officers are lobbying to get the additional charge of the college. The main contenders are said to be Deputy Director (Sports) A K Banoda and Regional Sports Officer at the headquarters,R P Singh. Banoda,a former national level football player,is a Class I officer. R P Singh,a former hockey international,is a Class II officer who already holds three additional charges RSO Faizabad,RSO Allahabad and RSO Lucknow. They have their political godfathers and are banking of them. But what justice can either of them do to a job which requires full attention of a man? Obviously,that is no concern of the godfathers who have deliberately created a situation so that they can plant their own man.

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