Snapshots

Mobile Policing

Carrying nearly six million passengers each day, Mumbai8217;s suburban railway system ferries half of all the daily railway passengers of the country and is the largest of its kind in the world. As a parting gift from Minister of State for Railways Ram Naik last week, it got its own police commissionerate, the first of its kind in the country. The nascent commissionerate has yet to find a suitable office, however, and is in search of police stations for its personnel even as its senior officers share workspace. In such times, parallels with the railway police8217;s recentinnovative idea of starting mobile police chowkies on certain long distance trains in Mumbai, haven8217;t escaped officials. 8220;Well, I8217;m hunting for a suitable space for office,8221; a senior official wryly replied when asked where he was based. And then looking at his cellphone he grinned: 8220;Right now all I have is a mobile police station.8221;

Sole Son

Twenty-nine-year-old Omar Abdullah, son of the Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah and grandson of the former Chief Minister Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, is in line for a berth in the council of ministers, or so he thinks. Although he is the youngest of all the four newly-elected National Conference NC members, he is actually the most experienced as a parliamentarian. Reason: all the other three are first-time Lok Sabha members and Omar has had a stint of 16 months in the 12th Lok Sabha.

In fact, among the three young MP sons8217; the others being Sukhbir Singh Badal and Omak Apang, he is the sole survivor in the 13th Lok Sabha. This factor toomay play a positive role in getting him inducted into the ministry now that dear papa has declared that the National Conference will participate8217; in the Government.

They Call Her Didi

Pune loves Lata Mangeshkar8230;and how! Queuing up hours in advance, even squatting cross-legged on the aisles in their Sunday best, kids et al, and watching in awe-struck silence on a screen outside the hall, hundreds turned up to catch a glimpse of Lata in Pune. While the melody queen seemed unfazed by the crowds she had attracted and the effusive praise lavished on her by the organisers addressing her as didi, one even admitted that he shivered in terror at the prospect of speaking to didi on the phone the evening before the function it was a veteran freedom fighter8217;s comment that finally got her smiling. 8220;I won8217;t call her didi because I am older,8221; said Shanta Kelkar, leader of mahila morchas during the Quit India Movement. 8220;Of course, my guess is that her voice is still barely 28years old.8221;

The Vaghela Factor

Whether in victory or in defeat, Keshubhai Patel and Shankersinh Vaghela manage to stay in the news. Usually, one8217;s gain proves to be the other8217;s loss. But after the Lok Sabha results from Gujarat, both have emerged stronger than before. Badgered by strife within his party as well as the severe water crisis and communal strife outside, Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel was on a sticky wicket.

The apprehension was the BJP would fare poorly in the elections and this would herald a change of guard. But the party improved its tally to provide a shot in the arm for Patel, whose critics have been struck dumb. Vaghela was anxious, for he had recently joined the Congress and Elections 8217;99 would decide his political fate. Victory was an absolute necessity. As it turned out, he romped home with a margin of over 1.5 lakh and, with two of his erstwhile RJP colleagues, accounted for half the sorry six seats that the Congress won. A section in the Congress has already startedtalking about putting Vaghela at the helm of a beleaguered Congress.

Darshan Desai in Ahmedabad, Pradeep Dutta in Jammu, Sandeep Unnithan in Mumbai and Reshma Patil in Pune