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| Good impression |
Is it a bad omen or an architectural flaw? In a country riddled with superstitions, the falling of a temple wall is usually believed to be only one thing — bad luck. So when a wall at the Mahakal temple in Ujjain fell hours before the president, Pranab Mukherjee, visited the site, politicians went into a tizzy and hotly debated whether the mishap would serve as a bad omen. Worried officials had initially denied the breaking of the wall; later, they attributed it to water seepage and a weak foundation. The Bharatiya Janata Party, which is in power in Madhya Pradesh, chorused that the broken wall could mean that the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government — the fortunes of which have been steadily dipping as the general elections approach — is courting trouble, since the president figuratively heads the Union government. The Congress quickly retorted that since the temple is located in MP, its crumbling wall could mean doom for BJP rule in the state, now that the assembly polls are round the corner.
Amidst such quibbling over the meaning of omens, Mukherjee made his mark in MP during his three-day visit. At a ceremony to mark the laying of the foundation stone of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Hindi University, the president spoke in chaste Hindi. He drew accolades from two excellent Hindi orators — the chief minister of MP, Shivraj Singh Chauhan, and the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj. Chauhan even conceded that unlike Mukherjee, who spoke only in Hindi, he himself had used a few English words such as ‘vice-chancellor’, ‘university’ and ‘computer’ in his speech. Broken temple walls and their purported meaning seemed to be forgotten amidst the appreciation showered on the president. Mukherjee, once again, proved his ability to make good of a seemingly ominous situation. The beleaguered UPA government will surely be missing his troubleshooting skills from his years as a Union minister.
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Meanwhile, in the BJP camp in Uttar Pradesh, the party’s general secretary, Varun Gandhi, is concentrating on mobilizing popular support for himself. For the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, the youngest Gandhi scion may change his constituency — currently he holds the Pilbhit seat — to Sultanpur. The latter is adjacent to Rae Bareili, the constituency represented by his aunt and Congress president, Sonia Gandhi. Sultanpur is also close to Amethi, which the Congress vice-president and Varun’s cousin, Rahul Gandhi, represents. If Varun does decide to switch to Sultanpur from Pilbhit, the district and its adjoining areas will virtually be a Gandhi bastion.
However, in its recent announcements of leaders who shall be in charge of party affairs in various states, the BJP appointed Varun as the in-charge of West Bengal. This was considered surprising, since barring Jaswant Singh, who represents Darjeeling, the state does not have any other member of parliament from the BJP. It is said that the party wants to develop its base in the east and the south of the country; even so it was not clear why the controversial Varun was put in charge of West Bengal. Before long, a senior leader decided to throw some light on the situation; he jokingly remarked that the BJP’s decision with regard to Varun may not be so surprising after all, since the young Gandhi, who is married to a Bengali, Yamini Roy Chowdhury, is now Bengal’s son-in-law.
The Congress has created a record of sorts — it now has 36 more spokespersons. Party insiders say that initially only 26 people were to be appointed. But then someone remembered a recent Bollywood release called Special 26 — a film where the actor, Akshay Kumar, leads a heist team posing as income tax officers and raids a jewellery store, conning the Central Bureau of Investigation in the process — and expressed apprehension that appointing only 26 spokespersons might give the BJP a chance to mock the Congress, in the wake of numerous scandals. The film was based on a real-life heist that occurred in Mumbai in 1987.
Disturbed by the prospect of attacks and jibes from the BJP, the Congress increased the tally to 36. However, there are still about a dozen aspirants imploring the AICC media head, Janardhan Dwivedi, to release a supplementary list of spokespersons. Some of them are even asking channel heads to put in a good word for them.
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Footnote
Smart reply
China might regularly be giving India cause for worry, but the ordinary Indian is also a formidable force to reckon with, as the Jammu & Kashmir chief minister, Omar Abdullah, found out. The latter was recently caught in a traffic jam in central Delhi, owing to the visit of the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang. Abdullah, hoping to catch a flight on time, had to walk a considerable distance. He soon tweeted, “Crazy traffic mess, just walked the length of Shahjahan Road to Kashmir House. My sympathies with all those stuck in the jams in Delhi.” While someone suggested he take the airport metro route, another Twitter user replied, “One small hurdle and you tweet? We face it so often but then all we do is grin & bear it. We are not VIPs, you see sir!!”
