Leaving nothing to chance

He arrived at Parliament half an hour before the voting was to begin,it is learnt just to check whether all security arrangements were in place.

UPA candidate Pranab Mukherjee had little to worry about in terms of competition from P A Sangma when voting was going on for the Presidential election,but there was another senior Congressman who had some cause for worry. Home Minister P Chidambaram was not ready to leave anything to chance as far as security of the Parliament building during the voting process was concerned,and was personally monitoring the arrangements. He arrived at Parliament half an hour before the voting was to begin,it is learnt just to check whether all security arrangements were in place.

Numero Uno

The Trinamool Congress has had to face several embarrassments during this Presidential election process,but one of its MPs had some sense of achievement. Rajya Sabha MP Derek OBrien became the first legislator from the Anglo-Indian community to participate in the Presidential election. And he was ecstatic. Thrilled8230;Humbled to be the 1st from the Anglo-Indian community to every vote in a Presidential election, he said on Twitter after voting. The Constitution provides for two people from the Anglo-Indian community to be nominated to the Lok Sabha. Members of this community have been nominated to the Rajya Sabha as well. But nominated members are not eligible to vote in the Presidential election,though they can vote for the election of the Vice-President. OBrien happens to be the first member of the community who has been elected to the Rajya Sabha. But he too could have missed out,since his party had initially decided to abstain from the election,and changed its mind only two days before voting.

For divine intervention

Kanumuri Bapiraju,Congress MP from Narsapuram in Andhra Pradesh,who is also the chairperson of the Tirupati Temple Trust,was the first MP to cast his vote in the Presidential election on Thursday. Though he was not the first in the queue,Bapiraju was allowed the privilege after he apparently said he had come straight from Tirupati with the blessings of Lord Balaji for UPA candidate Pranab Mukherjee. As he entered the polling booth,he removed his shoes as if entering a temple,folded his hands as in a prayer to remember Lord Balaji and then cast his vote.

Cut to size

Thanks to the insistence of Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni,the size of the official broadcasting team to cover the London Olympics will be considerably smaller than that on earlier occasions. For the Beijing Olympics,the Prasar Bharati had sent a team of about 80 people. This time,the first list of aspirants contained names of over 100 personnel. But Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar made several revisions and pruned the list down to about 60. Only technicians,camerapersons and commentators have been cleared to go. The requests from other officials have been turned down. Sircar has struck off his own name from the list too.

Gender bender

Having bungled badly in its handling of the Guwahati molestation case and after its remarks on how girls should dress up,the National Commission for Women probably wants to show some work. It has set up a committee on gender sensitisation. While it might do well to first educate some of its own members on the issue,this committee has been asked to carry out a study on the feasibility of introducing a course on this subject at the middle school level. Incidentally,the NCW already has a committee on gender and education.