Trouble seems to be brewing in Jammu and Kashmir. According to reports, the governor, Lt General S.K. Sinha, and Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed do not see eye to eye, their latest clash coming over the offer of dialogue with the Hurriyat. Sayeed has been pressing the Centre to start talking to the separatist group. Sinha is believed to have given the opposite advice. He felt the contradictions in the faction-ridden Hurriyat should be allowed to fester and Delhi should not get involved with an outfit perceived to be close to Pakistan. Sayeed has won this round but the political buzz is Sinha has warned the Centre not to play along with the chief minister. He’s apparently warned that the PDP government is in danger of being toppled by the National Conference in cahoots with the Congress. The Centre’s Kashmir policy should not be predicated, therefore, on Sayeed’s advice. The chief minister too is believed to have made it clear to Delhi that he’s unhappy with Sinha. In any case, he had requested a non-army, non-intelligence man be appointed governor so that there would no interference in his ‘‘healing touch’’ policy. His choice was Delhi’s lieutenant governor, Vijai Kapoor. But the BJP was unwilling to let go of him till after the December assembly polls. Sweetheart deals It’s not easy running a coalition government, as Uttar Pradesh’s Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav is discovering. He’s brought on a fresh headache with plans to lease out the 24 government-owned sugar mills in the state. Partner-in-government and RLD chief Ajit Singh is up in arms. There are wheels within wheels here. The frontrunner in the race to acquire the mills is believed to be businessman Kushagra Bajaj. Bajaj has several claims to fame. He already owns two sugar mills in Uttar Pradesh. He is a nephew of scooter magnate Rahul Bajaj. Most important, he is brother-in-law of industrialist Kumaramangalam Birla. It so happens that Birla has just been appointed member of the Uttar Pradesh Development Council, which is supposed to clear the privatisation proposal. Tongues are already wagging that Mulayam has not parted with any of the ministries that the Council is supposed to oversee, including the Ministry of Sugarcane Development. The sugar mills come under this ministry. Mulayam’s allies have started grumbling that he’s taking sweeping decisions without consulting them. Union Food Minister Sharad Yadav’s party, Janata Dal (United), has also put a spoke in the wheel. Party general secretary K.C. Tyagi has slammed the proposal. Sheila’s second thoughts The BJP may have given up the fight before it’s even begun in the Delhi assembly polls but that’s not stopped Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s worrying about her Gole Market seat. She barely scraped through in 1998 and she’s wavering about her chances this time. Her confidantes are believed to have advised her to consider contesting from two seats. They actually got an informal survey done to pinpoint a second seat. What’s worrying them is that Dikshit hasn’t nursed the constituency enough during her five years as chief minister. To make up, she’s parked her sister there for the past month, working on local voters on the chief minister’s behalf. According to Congress sources, Dikshit will decide whether or not to go in for a second seat only after she finds out who her BJP opponent is. The BJP is toying with two names. One is Poonam Azad, wife of cricketer Kirti Azad, who once represented Gole Market. The other is former DUSU president Vijay Jolly, whose family connections with the BJP and RSS are likely to ensure heavy saffron participation. Both names make Dikshit uncomfortable. But whoever’s heard of a chief minister losing when pre-poll surveys indicate a big win for her party?
