Hoist with own petard

PM dealt out

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s outburst against the NDA delegation on its budget memorandum was perhaps not directed just at the Opposition, but at those from his own party who had kept him out of the loop. Singh’ outrage that the budget would be passed without any debate is baffling considering that it was the Congress which had mooted the proposal in the first place.

With the continuing standoff between the NDA and UPA in Parliament, Leader of the Lok Sabha Pranab Mukherjee and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad were looking for a face-saving solution to end the deadlock so that the budget could be passed. Mukherjee offered three alternatives to the BJP. He suggested that either the budget could be passed amidst din or that the Opposition be permitted to create a hue and cry for the early part of the day and then later vote on the Finance Bill. A third option was that the budget could be passed without any debate. Leader of the Opposition L K Advani opted for the last suggestion since he did not want a repeat of the undignified scenes that took place at the time of the passing of the Railway Budget. The idea was acceptable to all parties, the only one with some reservations was Laloo Prasad Yadav. In the light of this background, Singh’s indignation was inexplicable. Unless, of course, his party leaders forgot to inform him of the arrangement.

The BJP has now decided that in future it will not meet the PM face to face. It will send all memoranda or documents through a courier service or a peon.

Congress not ready

Y S Vivekananda Reddy, the MP from Cuddapah in Andhra Pradesh, personally submitted to Speaker Somnath Chatterjee his hand-written letter of resignation a week back. But Chatterjee, instead of automatically accepting the resignation note, referred it to Pranab Mukherjee, leader of the Lok Sabha. Mukherjee, in turn, consulted Congress president Sonia Gandhi who was furious that Reddy had not taken the permission of the AICC before meeting the Speaker. The Congress does not want to contest a by-election so soon after the general election.

Reddy was about to leave for the USA, when his party ordered him to take back his resignation before Chatterjee left for Canada. Reddy’s resignation was so that his nephew Jagmohan Reddy, son of his brother Chief Minister Y S Rajashekhar Reddy could contest from the same constituency. But the Congress is not ready to encourage a Reddy dynasty in the State.

Circumstantial evidence

A function addressed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to honour 12 CBI officers for fighting corruption last week was given unusual prominence by DD news. The Director, News, took a personal interest and even ordered a back-up team to cover the function, though one camera team was already at Vigyan Bhavan. The ceremony was shown at length on news bulletins throughout the day. Apart from the PM’s speech and an interview with the CBI chief there was a long soundbyte from one of the award winners. Was it just a coincidence that the CBI official in question happens to be part of the investigating team in a case concerning the News Director?

Unhelpful Aide

Before the parliamentary polls, Jairam Ramesh, the dapper draftsman of the Congress party, was happy to appear on television shows and often urged TV journalists to take his soundbyte. But ever since the Congress has came to power, Ramesh has developed an aversion to the media. Even members of the Congress media cell complain that Ramesh has no time to brief them about decisions taken at the National Advisory Council (NAC).

Recently after an NAC meeting, Ramesh not only declined to speak to journalists, but even snapped at a TV correspondent who was interviewing another NAC member. Ramesh’s media phobia is directed mainly at Hindi TV journalists. He informed a correspondent they should be kept at a distance like AIDS patients and HIV virus carriers. After this insult to both the media and AIDS victims, many TV journalists have decided to give him the cold shoulder.