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Journalism of Courage
Chief Justice of India N V Ramana was in Srinagar this weekend to lay the foundation stone for the new court complex in the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh. He began his address invoking Urdu poet Ali Jawad Zaidi and read out a couplet in Urdu. The CJI said that although he has visited Kashmir several times, he is always moved by the hospitality and kindness of the people there. Incidentally, the petitions challenging the dilution of special stratus to Kashmir is pending before a bench headed by CJI Ramana.
Missing Out
By now it is evident that the BJP’s decision to appoint Manik Saha as Biplab Deb’s successor in Tripura has not gone down well with a section of the party’s state leadership. On Sunday, as Saha took oath as the new CM, Union minister Pratima Bhoumik made a cryptic remark while speaking to reporters. Bhoumik said she became emotional on Saturday as “I am not mechanical”. Pressed further, she said she would leave it to the interpretation of others on whether she let her emotions show out of joy or sadness. “Aapko jo samajhna hai aap samajhlo,” she said. It is believed that Bhoumik was among the names the BJP considered before picking Saha.
Language Gap
That the Congress has to regain lost ground in the Hindi heartland to give a challenge to the BJP is accepted by party leaders across the country. But the absence of an English version of the declaration adopted at the end of the three-day Udaipur chintan shivir has annoyed leaders from other regions, especially the delegates from the South and North-East. The declaration in Hindi was read out by Ajay Maken but no English version was circulated to the delegates. Many leaders said it was a departure from the past and wondered what the reason was. Incidentally, out of the 53 Lok Sabha MPs of the party, half are from the southern states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Telangana. The party has as many as 15 MPs from Kerala alone..
Discordant Note
THE STATEMENT by Rahul Gandhi that regional parties don’t have an ideology, that they belong to some caste and that have different approaches was interesting given the fact that the Congress is part of the JMM-led government in Jharkhand and a partner in the Maha Vikas Aghadi government in Maharashtra of which the NCP and Shiv Sena are partners. Moreover, the Congress fought the Lok Sabha elections and Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu in alliance with the DMK and the 2020 Assembly elections in Bihar in alliance with the RJD. The UDF mechanism in Kerala has always been projected as a shining example of the party’s coalition skills. Wonder what all these parties would make out of Rahul’s statement.
