Nagpur calling

Incidentally,Nagpur is also the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh RSS.

Nagpur calling

While Congress president Sonia Gandhi sought to mollify former Union minister Vilas Muttemwar,who was again left out of the Union Cabinet,by appointing him party general secretary and Arun Yadav,who was dropped from the Union Council of Ministers,as AICC secretary,talks at the party were about the over-representation of Nagpur in the party. Muttemwar is the fourth AICC office-bearer to hail from Nagpur,the others being general secretary Mukul Wasnik and secretaries Avinash Pandey and Anees Ahmed. Incidentally,Nagpur is also the headquarters of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh RSS.

Eye on site

WHILE researching for his new job at the Rural Development Ministry,Jairam Ramesh opened the official website of the ministry on Tuesday morning and is said to have been extremely dissatisfied with what he saw. The website was hardly of the quality that he would like his own ministrys to be. Ramesh,therefore,immediately told his personal aides to ensure that the makeover of the website was amongst the first tasks that had to be accomplished at his new office. Incidentally,Ramesh had inherited an equally poor website at the Environment Ministry before he made it a highly informative platform that carried almost real-time information. Ramesh also instructed his staff to ensure that the Rural Development Ministry had an equally good Hindi version as well,something that was lacking in the Environment Ministrys website.

Home Coming

THE constant speculation surrounding the return of IAS officer Pulok Chatterjee,currently serving a stint at World Bank,to the government is likely to come to an end now. It is learnt that Chatterjee,who is perceived to be close to 10,Janpath,is all set to take up an assignment at the Prime Ministers Office PMO from October 1. He is likely to replace M N Prasad,Secretary in the PMO.

On a Happy Note

MINISTER of State for Health Dinesh Trivedi who was elevated to a Cabinet rank in the reshuffle,was visibly a happy man on Tuesday. To convey his feelings to the officials in the Health Ministry,he treated them with a cup of tea and some sweets before he went for the swearing-in ceremony. Visibly elated to move to the Railway Ministry,he was all praise for the bureaucracy in the Health Ministry the same bureaucracy he had earlier criticised publicly,leading to a major furore. His farewell gesture was to offer his best wishes to all in the ministry he was leaving.

Lucky Break

GURUDAS Kamats resignation is likely to come in handy for UPAs youngest Minister Agatha Sangma. The separation of the Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation from the Ministry of Rural Development to accommodate Kamat as Minister of State Independent Charge has created a peculiar situation at the ministry headquarters in Krishi Bhawan. It has left three MoSes in the ministry with just two departments! And Sangma,one of the three MoSes,was the one assigned to look after Drinking Water and Sanitation till now.