Opinion Sending the wrong message
The Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity (DAVP) has privately denied it was responsible for carrying a photograph of former Pakistani Air Force Chief in a Ministry of Women and Child Welfare advertisement against female foeticide....
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The Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity (DAVP) has privately denied it was responsible for carrying a photograph of former Pakistani Air Force Chief in a Ministry of Women and Child Welfare advertisement against female foeticide. Although the DAVP uploaded the ad for publication in a newspaper,it had actually not made the ad and was not given any time to vet it either. Actually,the ads content and design were prepared by the very newspaper in which it finally appeared. The newspaper had an exclusive tie-up with the ministry to run the ad,which is against DAVP guidelines. Ads cannot be given to a single source. Instead,they have to be distributed in a specified ratio between large,medium and small newspapers. The ministry outsourced the advertisement to a private agency,which in turn struck a deal with the newspaper.
The photograph of the former Pakistani Air Chief Tanvir Ahmed is apparently not the only thing thats wrong in the ad. Feminists say it sends out a socially incorrect message on National Girl Child Day. The copywriter of the ad has highlighted the message that if girls were not born,their famous sons would not have been born either. Heit could not have been a she forgot that many girls grow up to make significant contributions to society as welland not just as mothers.
Electing to come
It took three phone calls from Chief Election Commissioner Navin Chawla to persuade AIADMK chief J Jayalalithaa to fly to Delhi to attend the function celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Election Commission. Perhaps the incentive given to her was that she would get a chance to meet Sonia Gandhi. In Chennai,however Jayalalithaa underplayed the meeting,informing the media that she had merely met Gandhi and exchanged pleasantries. Politics was not discussed.
But that was enough to make the DMK edgy,particularly as the old rivalry between Karunanidhis sons,M K Alagiri and M K Stalin,has flared up again over the line of succession. Alagiri feels his shift to the Capital as a central minister for Chemicals and Fertilizers was a tactical mistake and is in fact contemplating returning to Tamil Nadu next year. Significantly,Alagiri did not show up twice for a meeting with the Lok Sabha Speaker to discuss the details for getting his speeches in Parliament translated from Tamil,even though it was he who had made the demand in the first place.
Family ties
ON a recent visit to Mauritius when Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar met Mauritius Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam,he reminded her of the long standing ties between her family and his. Ramgoolam made the Speaker wait at the National Assembly while he searched through a bunch of old photographs to locate a picture of his late father Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam taken with Kumars father,Babu Jagjivan Ram. The Prime Minster wanted a photograph of himself and the Lok Sabha Speaker taken like the earlier one of their fathers.
All mixed up
THE Defence Ministry has an explanation to counter the story making the rounds that its minister A K Antony had confused the American ambassador with the Australian High Commissioner on Army Day. Antony was seen talking to the American ambassador and when the envoy took his leave,Antony was heard asking if he was was coming from Australia. According to the spokesperson,the eavesdropper who conveyed the conversation got it all mixed up since he couldnt hear properly with the Army Band playing in the background. The Australia reference was not for the ambassador but for US Defence Secretary Robert Gates,who was originally scheduled to come to India from Australia but later changed his travel plans.
Govt not party
Some see significance in the Congress distancing itself from the controversy over the Padma Bhushan to hotelier Sant Singh Chatwal. A Congressperson pointed out that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his wife attended the wedding of Chatwals son Vikram in 2006. Also,the PMs Principal Secretary T K A Nair was at the glittering opening of the Chatwals dream hotel in Kochi last April.
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