Opinion Stamp of approval?

Not good enough

Two Tughlaq Lane was the designated bungalow for the RAW chief. But Sanjeev Tripathi,who took over as head of RAW in December,and his wife found the bungalow inadequate and have been lobbying ever since for a larger accommodation. The Ministry of Urban Development has finally obliged and the more spacious 7 Tuqhlak Road has now been earmarked for the RAW boss and is being done up in style.

Glass houses and throwing stones

The DMK is doubly miffed with the Congress. On one hand,it believes that the Congress has harmed the DMK alliance’s prospects in the assembly election by contesting far too many seats. The 63 seats the Tamil Nadu Congress insisted on contesting is disproportionate to its actual strength on the ground. The DMK reckons that the strike rate of the Congress will be pretty low. Since the DMK is contesting only 120 seats on its own,it fears that together with its allies it may not be able to reach the half-way mark. The DMK is also furious with Rahul Gandhi for mocking at the 87-year- old CPI(M) Chief Minister of neighbouring Kerala,V S Achuthanandan,for standing for office at his age. DMK leader M Karunanidhi happens to be exactly the same age. While Jayalalithaa has discreetly avoided referring to the advanced years of her chief rival, AIADMK members have made full use of Rahul’s comment to take potshots at the octogenarian DMK leader.

Hijacking the cause

Was the National Advisory Council outmanoeuvred on the Lokpal Bill by activists close to Anna Hazare? The NAC,as the interface between the government and civil society,had formed a special working group,with Aruna Roy as convener,to recommend suggestions for giving the official draft on the Lokpal Bill more teeth. On the eve of Hazare’s agitation,the NAC committee on transparency and governance met members of civil society,including Arvind Kejriwal,Swami Agnivesh,Prashant Bhushan,Shanti Bhushan and Santosh Hegde. The NAC members were extremely supportive of Hazare’s hunger fast at the start,presuming that he would help build public support on the issue. But the tone of the NAC towards Hazare’s movement changed dramatically within days once it emerged that Hazare and his advisers had hijacked the cause and become part of the drafting committee along with senior ministers. The NAC found itself left out in the cold.

Non-cooperative colleagues

The appointment of Raghu Raman to head the National Intelligence Grid has caused considerable heartburn among senior officials in Delhi. Raman,who came from the private sector,is paid a handsome Rs 1.20 crore a year,far more than any bureaucrat. Raman,whose task is to identify the black money trail of terrorists,recently wrote to the authorities complaining that officialdom was not cooperating. The finance ministry turned down his request that banks furnish details of personal bank accounts to the grid as it felt that this would be a betrayal of customer trust. RAW and IB personnel were irked when they learnt that the Nat Grid chief had secretly made several trips to the Pentagon in Washington without taking any of them along,as was customary. At a recent meeting chaired by home secretary G K Pillai,the disconnect between Raman and the heads of security agencies was apparent.