Delhi Confidential: Delhi Dampener

TDP leader N Chandrababu Naidu, who suffered a big defeat in Andhra Pradesh, faced another setback — this time at the Parliament House in Delhi.

N Chandrababu Naidu

TDP leader N Chandrababu Naidu, who suffered a big defeat in Andhra Pradesh, faced another setback — this time at the Parliament House in Delhi. Room Number 5, where the Telugu Desam parliamentary party office is located, has been allocated by the Lok Sabha Secretariat to the YSR Congress. This is not a routine allotment, considering TDP has had the room since 1984. In August 2014, TDP MPs had physically resisted an attempt by TMC to take it over following an allotment in its favour, but a repeat performance is now unlikely. One, the YSR Congress would retaliate with full force. Two, Jagan Mohan Reddy, being friendly with the BJP, is likely to have the latter on his side.

Going Green

While the BJP has discontinued bottled water in its headquarters in solidarity with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s campaign against single-use plastic, some leaders have taken it a step further. BJP’s newly appointed general secretary (organisation) B L Santhosh has a notice pasted on his office door saying: “Namaskar. Please do not bring bouquet of flowers/gifts”. Another general secretary Arun Singh has asked the office to stop providing paper glasses that are used to drink water from the steel or glass jars kept on office tables. Pointing out that paper glasses would affect the environmental negatively, he has suggested that big jars with taps and reusable glasses be provided along with facilities to wash the glasses.

Full Speed

It seems department-related standing committees of Parliament are already in work mode. The notification announcing the constitution of the committees came on September 13. Five committees of the Rajya Sabha have already met and two will have their first meeting on September 30. Among the Lok Sabha committees, six have had their maiden meetings and three committees are scheduled to meet on Monday. When the panel on Law and Justice held its first meeting on Thursday for identification of subjects to be taken up for study during the next year, committee chairman Bhupender Yadav set a scorching pace, suggesting that the committee meet every week to complete study of pending and new subjects. He suggested that members make it part of their tour plan so as to attend the meetings every Monday.