Fly On The Wall

They arrived in Delhi, went to the PM8217;s official residence and measured him from head to toe. The measured thread was then taken to the dharamshala in west Delhi where the yajna was held. What was done to the thread is not known. But Vajpayee8217;s full-size portrait, as per the measurement, hidden behind a curtain, was kept there. This made up for his absence at end of the week-long yajna.

Problem in Patna

The caretaker BJP government will have to deal with the appointment of new Bihar Governor on October 5 in the midst of counting. Even if the Vajpayeegovernment desires to grant a temporary extension to the outgoing acting Governor B.M. Lall for a few weeks, it requires the Presidential nod. Lall8217;s term as the Chief Justice of the Patna High Court ends on October 5.

Logically, the new Chief Justice should be sworn-in as the new acting Governor. But Lall, it is learnt, is keen to continue as acting Governor. So is the BJP-Samata alliance.

Watch out for Hegde

Don8217;t write off Ramakrishna Hegde. He can turn out to be the dark horse in the post-election scenario. If the NDA crosses the 300-seat mark, there will not be any problems for Vajpayee. But anything less than 280 could cause problems. George Fernandes who once aspired to be the Prime Minister has burnt his boats with Sonia after his snide remarks on her. Hegde, however, has been maintaining a total silence on the Congress. Recently, CPM general Secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet and Hegde spoke to each other over the phone. Except for Hegde, the Congress and the Left cannot accept any leaderof the NDA for the prime minister8217;s post in a hung House.

Exit for TV crew

Come elections and pollsters have a field day. But never before has a poll caused so much anger in political circles as the NDTV-Insight Exit poll has. The poll telecast four days after the third phase of polling 8212; gave 213 to the BJP and 90 to the Congress out of a total of 344. The AICC establishment was so enraged that the NDTV crew which was to accompany Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday morning to the North-east and Bhubaneshwar was told at midnight that the tour is off for them.

The NDTV crew had been trying hard for a long time to do a 24 Hours with Sonia Gandhi programme. They had shot all top leaders including the Prime Minister. But Sonia was reluctant but finally agreed. She changed her mind after the exit poll.

In the process, other mediamen who were to accompany Sonia also suffered. They were told that an extra aircraft to take them along could not be arranged and the programme was cancelled.

Flyingtime

After pollsters predicted doom for the Congress during the initial weeks of polling, the principal Opposition party has come a long way. The cash crunch is a thing of the past. The Congress is perhaps the only party which has pressed into service so many aircraft and choppers into service for the last phases of campaigning. The party hired a special aircraft to fly its spokesman Kapil Sibal to Lucknow to make an allegation against Atal Behari Vajpayee at a press conference. He returned to the Capital by the chartered flight the same afternoon.

But the BJP did not lag behind. It flew Arun Shourie and K.N. Govindacharya to rebut the charge.

Manmohan Singh too has been given a special aircraft to actively campaign in Pilibhit, the seat where Sonia8217;s sister-in-law Maneka Gandhi is contesting.