DECEMBER 23: CM by proxyDigvijay Singh may be the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh but Rural Development Minister Sunderlal Patwa has found a novel method to rule the state by proxy. He has decided to appoint MPs to head theDRDA. So far, the DRDAs have been headed by IAS officers chosen by Chief Ministers in various states and in some cases, the elected heads of the Zila Panchayats. Since Madhya Pradesh has 29 BJP MPs, Patwa has proposed to send them to head DRDAs. These agencies have enormous funds for rural development.Burnt fingersThe Opposition is desperately looking for `soft targets' in the Union Council of Ministers after burning its fingers on Disinvestment of PSUs and the functioning of Prasar Bharti. It has decided not to take on the Minister of State for I&B and Disinvestment Arun Jaitley in the next session. On both the occasions, Opposition walked out tamely after it ran out of arguments.When S. Jaipal Reddy of the Congress charged Jaitley with being slippery andbrash in removing Romilla Thapar and Rajendra Yadav from the Prasar Bharti Board, pat came the reply that the appointment of the board was a bigger than Bofors scam. If the Rs 1437 crore Bofors deal file moved 9 tables in 48 hours during the Rajiv era, the files relating to appointment of Rs 5,5000-crore Board chairman moved 25 tables in 36 hours when Reddy was I&B Minister. So now the opposition is planning to target Sharad Yadav, Ram Naik, T.R. Balu, Naveen Patnaik, or Dilip Ray.Mysterious silenceThe silence of the CBI, Enforcement Directorate and Revenue Intelligence agencies on proceeding against all those named by alleged hawala dealer Abhishek Verma has baffled Capital's power circuit. Even senior BJP leader Vijay Kumar Malhotra who raised the issue of Verma's involvement with bigwigs, was politely told not to get unnecessarily worked up.The anti-corruption brigade of the BJP is completely silent on the issue. Verma's singing notes with the agencies run over 300 pages they name twoCWC members, five senior bureaucrats and one UP minister.At homeThanks to Jagmohan, the BJP will have its own building. The Congress has Jawahar Bhawan in the heart of the city and other political parties have their buildings on land provided by the government at concessional rates. Now a 3,300 sq m plot has been allotted to the BJP in the name of Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Trust. But some BJP leaders argue that being the ruling party, it should be formally allotted the 11 Ashok Road itself as was done in the case of the Congress.Advani's missionHome Minister L.K. Advani is determined not to allow any misuse of official machinery in the name of security. In addition to pruning the fat list of all those under threat by a constant review, he has now decided to get vacated the bungalows allotted to non-MPs in the name of security. He has decided that security would be provided to these persons .The editor of a Hindi daily is worried and so are 25 others who were given govt houses.Some of them have already approached the PMO to ensure that Advani does not proceed any further. Urban Development Minister Jagmohan is also keen to get these bungalows back as more than 30 ministers and 200 newly elected MPs are without houses.
