Breaking convention

The youth wings of BJP and Congress are in confrontation mode over the issue of corruption. With BJP’s youth wing staging a protest in front of Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s residence on Tuesday on the issue of alleged corruption by Himachal Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh,Congress’s youth organisation returned the favour Wednesday with a protest against BJP president Rajnath Singh over the likely induction of former Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa in the party. Yeddyurappa has only indicated to disband his party and the BJP is yet to welcome him formally into the party. The Youth Congress protests,however,have only added to Singh’s predicament as he is learnt to be trying hard to get BJP patriarch L K Advani to soften his stand against Yeddyurappa.

LAW PREVAILS

The Pallam Raju-led HRD Ministry’s last-ditch effort to somehow restore the powers of chairman All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) S S Mantha has been dealt a blow by the Law Ministry. Court orders have sparked a turf war between the University Grants Commission and AICTE over control of technical education and the HRD Ministry has been making a series of efforts to restore the Mantha-led council’s powers but to no avail. Having given up on the possibility of an amended Bill passing through Parliament,the ministry had to even shelve its ordinance plan in view of Rahul Gandhi’s response to the ordinance on convicted MPs. The latest effort to restore powers to Mantha through an executive order has also been rejected by the Law Ministry.

BUILDING A TEAM

The BJP is attracting a bunch of bureaucrats into its fold — the grapevine has it that well-known diplomat Hardeep Puri,who retired as India’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations,is all set to join the party soon. Once a contender for the post of foreign secretary,Puri was always seen as strong on delivery and results. His joining the party,insiders said,is an indicator that the party is seriously working on putting together its team of experienced hands in various fields. Only recently,the party inducted former Union Home secretary R K Singh and former petroleum secretary R S Pandey into the party.

COLLATERAL DAMAGE

With the prospect of a CBI probe into alleged irregularities in the distribution of emergency quota to waitlisted tickets and a possible involvement of touts,the Railway Ministry effected a new feature on its website to make sure that reservation data cannot be accessed by hacking programmes. As a part of the process,now the innocuous feature of fetching PNR status on the website is now “protected” by security code,which every user has to enter,to prove he is not a machine. Apparently,a section of officials were against this move,saying it was unnecessary,but the objections did not find takers because of Railways’ paranoia about touts.