Fancy flights

ONE reason behind the governments delayed reaction on the recommendations of the Liberhan Commission report was the inclusion in it of the name of former prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee,who has been ailing for quite some time. Home Ministry officials say while the government wanted to proceed against Lal Krishna Advani and other Hindutva leaders indicted in the report,it held back because of Vajpayees name. Since Liberhan had painted Vajpayee with the same brush as Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi,ways were being devised to find out how others could be acted against while ensuring that the former prime minister didnt get any heat.

In Ram season,Mahabharata

Guess what L K Advani was reading last week besides the voluminous Liberhan Commission report. The protagonist of the Ayodhya movement finished reading Gurcharan Dass The Difficulty of Being Good and Ramdhari Singh Dinkars Rashmirathi two books which discuss the idea of righteousness in the Mahabharata,and the life and times of Karna,respectively. Often called the BJPs rath-yatri,Advani may not have been listed as a regular speaker by the party for the debate on the Liberhan Commission report in the Lok Sabha,but he may intervene after various speakers have spoken on the subject in the House on Tuesday.

Silent Arjun Singh bides time

SENIOR Congress leader Arjun Singh maintained a studied silence even as some of his party colleagues,like M L Fotedar,went public rejecting the Liberhan Commissions clean chit to former prime minister P V Narasimha Rao in the Babri Masjid demolition case. The Human Resource Development minister in the Rao government,Singh had chosen not to resign after the incident,although he was said to have been inclined to do so. He waited two years to finally quit. Now,Singh would like people to wait at least four months before he gives his take on the Liberhan Commission report. My autobiography will be out in March next year. Wait till then, he said,promising to reveal all stated and unstated facts about the demolition. Pressed further,he said: I too know something about publicity.

A Home huddle

FORCED to agree to the immediate tabling of the Liberhan Commission report in Parliament following the publication of its findings in The Indian Express,the Home Ministry worked overtime on Monday evening to prepare the Action Taken Report ATR. The job was entrusted to eight joint secretaries,with the most tech-savvy among them leading the charge. To prevent word from getting out,the job was completed in utmost secrecy with the senior officers even typing out the entire ATR themselves. It was also the first time the joint secretaries got a chance to look at the Liberhan Commission report,which had been kept a closely guarded secret by Home Minister P Chidambaram till the publication of its findings on Monday.

Once bitten,twice shy

UNDER attack from the Opposition over the alleged 2G Spectrum scam,Communications amp; Information Technology Minister A Raja has decided to play it safe while dealing with crucial files. According to ministry officials,he has stopped appending his signature to or making any notings on files. He does not even use yellow markers to make his remarks. Instead,Raja now prefers issuing verbal instructions to his deputies and officials.

Collaterals of a scam

THE ongoing court of inquiry into a dubious land deal in Darjeeling has landed the Kolkata-based Eastern Command in quandary. With an unprecedented number of senior officers three Lieutenant Generals,one Major General and several Brigadiers being called for questioning,the cantonment is facing a space crunch. Each Lt Gen who has been called or attached for the inquiry,or is conducting the inquiry,needs his own office and basic staff,as per protocol. Last heard,several mid-level officers,including Lt Cols and Majors,had been herded out of their regular offices into temporary accommodation till the inquiry gets over.

AI turbulence at NCW

The National Commission for Women NCWs report on the Air India molestation case may have brought some reprieve for the accused pilots,but it caused quite a bit of heartburn within the NCW. The report was released by the commission members while Chairperson Girija Vyas was out of town,and after she returned,a miffed Vyas refused to accept or sign it. The report,meanwhile,had already been sent to the Minister for Women amp; Child Development. The clean chit ahead of the Parliament session further troubled Vyas,who was worried the issue could be raked up in the House. She was mollified only when the members agreed to bring changes to the report and add words like the dignity of the woman should have been maintained and that she should not have been pushed.

Present,but not attending

THE Rajya Sabha witnessed an unusual scene earlier this week. Even while Special Mentions were on,K Rehman Khan,who was in the Chair,suddenly found that there was no Cabinet Minister in the House. When his calls for a Cabinet minister yielded no results,the Chair adjourned the House for five minutes. It later transpired that all the while Minister for Overseas Affairs Vayalar Ravi was in the House but had walked down to the Opposition benches to chat with BJP leader Arun Shourie. So engrossed was the minister in this conversation that he did not even hear the Chair calling for a minister. Once the House met again,the minister clarified that he had only gone to discuss the business of the House with Shourie and in the din failed to hear the Chair.

1 more to Trinamool

NOTHING attracts like success,and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee is soaking it in. The grapevine has it that the lone Lok Janshakti Party LJP MP in the Rajya Sabha,Sabir Ali,has expressed his willingness to merge with the Trinamool,and Mamata has indicated she has no problems. According to her aides,apart from increasing the strength of her party in the Upper House,Alis presence in the Trinamool would send a positive signal to her Muslim vote bank. Mamata is learnt to be verifying the antecedents of the MP from Bihar before taking the final call. As for LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan,the fall from grace post his poll rout continues.

New Mamata promise

RAILWAYS Minister Mamata Banerjee has hit upon one more idea to reflect her concern for the common man. Her ministry has revived a plan originally initiated during Lalu Prasad Yadavs term,and amended it a little,to provide reverse osmosis-purified drinking water to the public through vending machines at railway stations. However,against the original plan which envisaged selling this water at Rs 3 per litre,the Railways now wants this facility to be provided free of cost to all rail users. To make up for the cost,private parties will be allowed to set up and operate these machines and to earn revenue through commercial advertising on the machines. Taking no chances,the Railways have specified that the ads put on these machines will have to be cleared by railway authorities and should not have content like airline ads that may affect its business.

Putting Front behind

SIX months have passed since the Lok Sabha elections,but the CPM,it seems,has not yet forgotten the Third Front fiasco. So much so that general secretary Prakash Karat made it a point to clarify that nothing much should be read into a meeting that he held last week with Chandrababu Naidu,whose TDP was a key player in the Front. Naidu,Karat clarified,had discussed the issue of illegal mining in Andhra Pradesh with him and could meet other political leaders also in this connection.

Tailpiece

UNION Minister for Sports amp; Youth Affairs M S Gill was at the receiving end when a Calling Attention was moved by BJPs Kalraj Mishra in the Rajya Sabha over Delhis preparedness for the Commonwealth Games next year. The criticism apart,the ministers defence also led to giggles in the House. Talking

about the readiness of the Commonwealth Games Village,Gill continuously referred to it as adjoining the Akashdarshan temple,instead of Akshardham temple. While some wondered which temple the minister was

talking about,others sympathised with him for getting confused after the stinging criticism of his ministry.