Jekyll and Hyde Gowda

Reports of Deve Gowda8217;s old style politics of browbeating industrialists and blocking modernisation and reform in Bangalore come as a s...

Reports of Deve Gowda8217;s old style politics of browbeating industrialists and blocking modernisation and reform in Bangalore come as a surprise to bureaucrats who worked under him when he was Prime Minister in 1996.

T S R Subramaniam, then Cabinet Secretary, in his book, Journeys through Babudom and Netaland, praises Gowda for his minimal interference in governance and for pushing through major reforms despite a fractious coalition.

To make clear that he wanted a completely honest and straightforward government, Gowda even cautioned Subramaniam that his sons and other relatives might try to exploit their proximity to him, but the administration should ignore their requests.

So why has Gowda changed his colours? One reason could be that Gowda feels bitter that no one gave him credit for his exemplary conduct as PM and he was rudely shunted out of the PMO in 10 months.

Tuvalu, not Baalu

Shipping Minister T R Baalu is peeved with the MEA for not according his visit to the USA the importance he thinks it deserved. At the Washington airport there was only a junior official to receive him, while he expected the ambassador, Ronen Sen, to be present. To show his displeasure, Baalu boycotted the official dinner hosted by the Indian embassy.

During the last regime, the DMK leader, who was then part of the NDA government, also had a grievance against the MEA. Baalu, as environment minister, was at a summit in South Africa when the organisers invited the representative from Tuvalu, a small country in the Caribbean Islands, to come to the podium. Baalu assumed that they were referring to him and embarrassed himself by walking to the stage. He felt that the MEA should have alerted him that one of the countries at the conference had a name similar to his own.

Grace and favour housing

The recent Supreme Court case dealing with VIPs living unauthorisedly in government bungalows exposes the double standards of the Directorate of Estates in the Ministry of Urban Affairs. When it wants to, the directorate can always conjure up a ready excuse for permitting an unauthorised tenant to stay on. It was the directorate which in the first place allotted Buta Singh a ministerial bungalow on the grounds of security.

Take the case of the two ministerial bungalows at 25 Akbar Road and 5 Raisina Road, officially allotted to the general secretaries of the Congress but which have for decades served as the headquarters of the Youth Congress and the Mahila Congress. A government flat in Chanakyapuri has also been allotted to a third unnamed party general secretary. The directorate woke up to the illegality of the tenancies during the NDA regime and eviction was ordered in January 2001. But the tenants never moved out.

The Additional Solicitor General recently explained to the Supreme Court that those to be evicted should be allowed to stay on till a policy is framed for allotment of accommodation to registered parties. Interestingly, the former general secretary of the CPIM, Harkishen Singh Surjeet, was shown no such consideration.

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Even if a new policy for bungalow allotments to political parties is actually framed, surely the Congress has exhausted its quota? The Congress already occupies the spacious No 24 Akbar Road. In 1989, the government sold large plots on Rajendra Prasad Road and Raisina Road at a throwaway price to the Congress. The private Rajiv Gandhi Foundation now stands at the site. Priyanka Gandhi occupies an MP8217;s house in Lodhi Estate and Rahul Gandhi, a first time MP, has been allotted a ministerial bungalow on Tughlak Road.

From 4 Cs to Syuppies

K N Govindacharya was considered the BJP8217;s one-man think-tank in the days before Marxist-turned-saffron journalists and superannuated officials became the party8217;s reigning intellectuals. In his heyday, Govindacharya had in fact coined some of the catch phrases used by the BJP, including the four Cs that mark a Sangh man 8212; chal, charitra, chera and chintan. He also introduced the expression 8216;8216;social engineering8217;8217; to the party8217;s lexicon.

Govindacharya, now out of the BJP, recently coined a new word to describe the Generation Next BJP leaders. He dismissively referred to them as Syuppies, that is saffronised yuppies.

Watch this space

It can hardly be coincidence that the massive billboards outside the BJP8217;s headquarters at 11 Ashoka Road reflect quite accurately the changing power equation in the party. After the BJP victories of 1998 and 1999, Vajpayee was the unquestioned hero of the billboards and there was no space for anyone else. After a while, a small picture of L K Advani surfaced in one corner. When Venkaiah Naidu took over as party president, a new hoarding appeared with pictures of Vajpayee, Advani and Naidu of equal size. Eyebrows were raised at the president8217;s attempts at self promotion and Naidu8217;s picture soon disappeared. Only photos of Vajpayee and Advani remained. This was at the time when the theme of dual leadership was being propagated for the next polls.

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After the 2004 electoral reverses and Advani8217;s return as BJP president, his picture dominated the office frontage for months. Pramod Mahajan was the flavour for a brief week, when a billboard announced that he was chief guest at a religious function. But with a beleaguered Advani finally conceding he will be stepping down as president, his picture has vanished. At the moment, there is simply a huge poster of the party8217;s 25th anniversary with a lotus, and no personalities are projected.