Delhi Confidential: Speech To Book

Two of the seven Congress candidates who contested Lok Sabha elections this summer have switched over to the BJP, one has shifted base to Delhi, while another one is said to be so cut up with the party high command that he even turned up at a workers’ meeting of the Trinamool Congress. That, in short, is the story of the grand old party in election-bound Jharkhand. Adding to that is the fact that Ajoy Kumar, who led the party into Lok Sabha polls in Jharkhand, has joined the Aam Aadmi Party, and the lone AICC secretary from the state — Arun Oraon — has also jumped ship. While Manoj Yadav and Sukhdeo Bhagat have joined the BJP, Kirti Azad now heads the Congress campaign committee in Delhi. Subodh Kant Sahay, one gets to hear, had recently made an appearance at a TMC workers’ meet.

Lawyers With Lathis

The Ghaziabad bench of the Railway Claims Tribunal has been shut down and merged with the principal bench in Delhi recently. One of the reasons behind the administrative decision, as per Rail Bhawan officials discussing the ongoing tiff between lawyers and Delhi Police, was that lawyers purportedly entered the premises with lathis and intimidated the tribunal staff. The issue at stake, apparently, was that a large number of claims cases were being rejected on merit. The police were called in, as were the Railway Protection Force, to protect the tribunal staff for a whole week.

Carrying Concern

The no-plastic rule has caused some unforeseen problems for MPs, too. When an MP recently bought at the Tea Board outlet inside Parliament he was handed four bulky boxes without anything to carry them in. When the MP asked for a bag, he was told that the file for acquiring paper bags had just been moved.