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Journalism of Courage
Spending money on media (management) can’t buy you election victories. Or so says S P Singh Baghel, Union Minister of State for Law and Justice. In fact, Baghel says he spent money on only one occasion. And he lost. “…I have not spent even a rupee on the media in the six elections I have won. The one in which I spent some money, I lost to Akhilesh Yadav,” Baghel said, referring to his defeat to the Samajwadi Party chief from Karhal constituency in last year’s Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls. The Lok Sabha MP from Agra, who was speaking at an RSS function on Monday, said he became an MP for the first time — in 1998 — with an expense of Rs 12 lakh. His poll expenses, he said, rose marginally to Rs 14 lakh in his second victory, and Rs 16 lakh the third time in 2004. And, he added, “a Rs 20 photostat got me into Rajya Sabha”.
Mention No Tension
Mentioning hours in the Supreme Court are when lawyers bring matters that require urgent attention to the notice of the Chief Justice of India so that they can be taken up for hearing, if needed. Ever since he assumed office, Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud has allotted more time for mentioning. The result: the numbers that were in double digits are now in three digits. But Monday saw all records broken as the number reached 237. The CJI himself announced this at the start of the day’s proceedings.
No Skipping, Please
The Ministry of Rural Development annually holds a two-day meeting of the Performance Review Committee to assess the progress of its schemes and programmes, including MGNREGS and PMAG-Y. The meeting will be held on May 18-19 this time. The Additional Chief Secretary and Principal Secretaries of the Department of Rural Development are invited to participate in the meeting. It has, however, been noticed by the ministry that secretaries from states participate in the meeting only on the first day, not the second. Noticing this trend, Rural Development Secretary Shailesh Kumar Singh has sent a missive to all state secretaries. “This is a very important meeting…I request you to personally participate in this consultation on both days…”
