Battle stations

The state leadership of Congress in Kerala was caught unawares when the party high command summoned top leaders to New Delhi last week. Trouble started when the leader of the Opposition in the state, VD Satheesan, expressed that he was inconvenienced by having to attend the first meeting of the newly-appointed jumbo committee of office bearers at the state party headquarters at Indira Bhavan in Thiruvananthapuram. The organisational revamp took place after years of delay. Apparently, several Congress leaders alerted the AICC general-secretary and Wayanad member of Parliament, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, about growing dissent among leaders and she immediately alerted the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, and the Congress president, Mallikarjun Kharge, about issues plaguing the Kerala Congress. The AICC leadership has put great responsibility on the Kerala team ahead of the legislative assembly election due in summer. Kharge and his team have also constituted a core committee in Kerala for the local bodies’ election due in December. In the upcoming assembly elections, the Grand Old Party wants nothing short of a Congress-led government returning to power after a decade of sitting in the Opposition.

Curious change

The president of the Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi, Saurabh Bharadwaj — he had started a YouTube channel called Berozgar NetaJi after losing his seat in this year’s assembly polls — seems to have found a calling in journalism. His piece to camera on a sanitised pool on the banks of the Yamuna, ostensibly created for the prime minister to take a dip in for Chhath Puja, went viral. Later in the week, the AAP leader praised freedom of speech in the United States of America, by sharing a clip of the country’s vice-president, JD Vance, being grilled by a member of the public over immigration and religion — without the questioner being interrupted. Yet, many were quick to point out that the AAP had disallowed hostile media from its pressers when it ruled Delhi.

Attack mode

The last few days have seen the chief minister of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma, launch a virulent attack on the Congress. The nature of the attacks has been personal and without filter. Sample these: He has described the Karnataka minister, Priyank Kharge, as a “first rate idiot” for the latter’s comment on the setting up of semiconductor units in Assam and Gujarat. He has called for a ban on the Congress president, Mallikarjun Kharge, for “insulting” Bharat Ratna Bhupen Hazarika. He has alleged that the Congress and the “ miyan population (Muslim Bengalis)” of Assam are working to see Assam included in Bangladesh. He has ordered the filing of a first information report against the Sribhumi District Congress Committee for singing the “ Amar sonar Bangla ” at a party meeting. He has accused Gaurav Gogoi of being a Pakistani agent. Political observers are sure that these attacks are not without reason. It is an attempt to somehow divert the attention from the overwhelming emotion surrounding Zubeen Garg’s untimely demise, reflected in the response to the opening of the singer’s last movie — Roi Roi Binale — with grief-stricken viewers reiterating the call for justice while leaving the theatres. But nothing the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government or the CM has done so far — be it attacking the Congress or tabling the 1983 Nellie massacre report in the assembly to cracking down on the radical Veer Lachit Sena — seems to be working. The Zubeen Garg episode has overshadowed everything happening in the state.

Copy cat

What Naveen Patnaik had been doing while dealing with cyclones during his regime, Mohan Charan Majhi followed step by step. The tone of the Majhi government remained the same. Like his predecessor, Majhi also visited the control room at night and discussed the evolving situation with officials. A photo of this was released to the media immediately. It is the dissemination of information on State preparedness that is significant. Fortunately for Majhi, Cyclone Montha spared Odisha. There was hardly any damage and no casualties were reported.