Sahib Singh ka gussa

As there was plenty of empty seats on the unscheduled flight, the cricketers were permitted to spread out on the middle seats between the aisles in the economy class. An air-hostess while preparing the cricketer’s beds sternly warned the passengers sitting on the seats near the windows not to disturb them since they were very tired.

Firebrand Janata Dal (U) member and Chairman of the Central Warehousing Corporation K.C. Tyagi justifiably lost his cool and pointed out that the only people bothering the cricketers were the Air India crew which had been pestering the sportsmen with their constant requests for autographs.

An additional cause for Singh’s anger was that when the plane finally landed at Mumbai, other VIP passengers were more adept in securing early connecting flights to Delhi. Law Minister Arun Jaitley rushed immediately from Sahar to Santa Cruz and managed to catch the very next IA flight to the Capital.

Congress MP Jyotiraditya Scindia and several others caught the subsequent connecting flight. Singh got left behind since he had insisted on remaining in the plane. When the minister discovered that he was the lone VIP waiting patiently for the much postponed Jet flight he exploded.

Lib and ad-lib

The Congress rule is ‘‘one-man-one-post’’ without exception. Gandhis naturally are a cut above the rest, so no one dared raise the fact that Sonia Gandhi manages two posts: leader of the Opposition and president of the Congress. But there are other deviations.

Ambica Soni is both political secretary and general secretary, Chandresh Kumari is president of the Mahila Congress and a minister in Himachal Pradesh, Vidya Stokes is PCC chief of HP and a minister in the state. Men in the Congress ad lib sarcastically that obviously the ‘‘one-man-one-post’’ is not applicable to females in the party, since they are not men.

Blowing hot

Western diplomats often mock Indian and Pakistani representatives for getting carried away by their emotions and squabbling publicly at private functions on the subject of Kashmir.

But Iraq seems to have changed the disposition of the normally phlegmatic Europeans and Americans judging by the heated debates on the issue in the Delhi cocktail circuit. At a recent dinner in the Capital, there were sharp and very undiplomatic exchanges between the American ambassador and his counterparts from France and Germany.

The former lamented the spilling of American blood in Iraq, and made clear that those not with the coalition forces could not expect a piece of the pie in the reconstruction of post-war Iraq.

Monkeying around

Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw’s refreshing candor got him into hot water at times. Former Defence Minister Krishna Menon compiled his politically incorrect jokes in a bid to get him removed from the Army.

‘‘It was the Chinese who saved me,’’ confesses Manekshaw since Menon and his favourite, General Kaul, were themselves removed following the Chinese debacle. Manekshaw’s frankness may have been a handicap as an Army commander-in-chief but is surely a boon for any historian.

Among the nuggets thrown up in the documentary War and Peace premiered on his 90th birthday last week, two stick out. Manekshaw recalled that Pandit Nehru was so hesitant to order the Army into Kashmir in 1947, which was overrun by armed men from across the border, that Sardar Patel had to literally goad him with the remark, ‘‘Do you want Kashmir or not?’’ After the Shimla Agreement, Manekshaw told Prime Minister Indira Gandhi forthrightly, ‘‘Bhutto has made a monkey out of you.’’

Redundant Service

The CEO of Prasar Bharati, K.S. Sarma, has conveyed to the I&B Ministry that DD and AIR do not require the service of the 250-odd officers who are from the Indian Information Service (IIS).

Prasar Bharati is undergoing an economy crunch and the organisation feels that if its radio and TV channels are to be run efficiently they should not have to contend with the dead wood inherited from the government. Besides, since the IIS cadre officers are in senior positions, it is difficult to hire recruits from the open market, as government salaries are much lower than the private sector.

Sarma’s suggestion is unlikely to find favour with the ministry which is already hard-pressed trying to accommodate its large army of IIS cadre officers. The Geethakrishnan Committee on excess expenditure had recommended closing all the units manned by IIS staffers, from the DAVP and Films Division to the Song and Drama Division. Even Jaswant Singh wants the Finance Ministry’s press relations handled by non-IIS officers.