Evergreen Jairam

Guess who is the blue-eyed boy of Anna Hazare and Co in the UPA government? Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh.

Guess who is the blue-eyed boy of Anna Hazare and Co in the UPA government? Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh. When the joint drafting committee on Lokpal Bill was to be constituted,civil society members proposed that Ramesh should be one of the members from the governments side on the committee. HRD Minister Kapil Sibal,however,objected to it saying that in that case the government could also decide who would be on the committee from the civil societys side. That forced Anna and his associates to withdraw their case. Incidentally,Ramesh has maintained a studied silence while his party and the government are at the receiving end of the civil societys diatribe.

Piracy alert

Even as an Indian warship sparred with a Pakistani naval vessel in the Gulf of Aden over escorting a released merchant vessel,a piracy scare was sounded much closer to Indian shores,throwing the western coast on high alert. Two piracy attempts were reported off the Kerala coast on Saturday by merchant vessels,prompting a scan of the area by naval choppers and warships. The alert turned out to be a false alarm. What really had eyebrows raised,however,was the proximity of the alert to the Indian coast both attempts were reported within 15-30 nautical miles off Thiruvananthapuram.

Pawar punch

The Congress core group has finally decided to call for an all-party meeting on the Lokpal Bill issue,but the one wearing the I-told-you-so look is NCP leader and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar. In a meeting with Congress president Sonia Gandhi just after the joint drafting committee had been set up,Pawar had conveyed that having such a committee with the civil society without any representation from the Opposition parties was not a healthy practice. He had urged her to let the government consider inviting members from the Opposition,but sources said the Congress felt it was too late in the day to do so.

Occult politics

One would normally associate BJP leaders with Hindu tantriks when it comes to party leaders taking resort to the occult to better their fortunes. With so much at stake,some of them are,however,trying their luck overcoming their mental block. Consequently,a Muslim holy man who operates from a mosque near Sunehri Bagh is having a busy time working for BJP leaders. Personal rivalries in the BJP being what they are,the next one may hear could well be tales of jadu-tona.

Special flight

That there are no daily flights from New Delhi to Islamabad has come as a blessing in disguise for Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao. For this reason alone,she has been allowed to use a special government plane because no commercial flights are available for June 23. As a result,there is a bit more exclusivity to the visit this time with select officials and the on- board media in tow a rarity for FS-level visits.