Cornered over Kumbh
Puri Shankaracharya Jagadguru Swami Nischalanand Saraswati lashed out at the dignitaries present at a religious occasion in Chhattisgarh state recently for “usurping the privileges” of religious leaders. The Puri seer was furious with the Bharatiya Janata Party government in the state for observing “Kumbh” at Rajim without religious sanction. He minced no words when chastising the dignitaries present during the closing ceremony of the 10-day annual religious festival which began on Mahashivratri Day at Rajim, the confluence of the rivers Mahanandi, Sindhur and Pairi, in Chhattisgarh’s Gariabandh district.
“Who gave you the right to declare the festival a Kumbh? You are not authorised to tamper with religious matters. You should not think that you can encroach upon the privileges of religious and spiritual gurus only because you are in power,” said the Shankaracharya gesturing towards the dignitaries that included Chhattisgarh governor Shekhar Dutt, state religious affairs minister Brij Mohan Agrawal, and state culture minister Ajay Chandrakar.
Turning his ire particularly on the Governor, he said, “Main aapse puchta hun rajyapalji, kya aap kisi dal vishesh ke prabhav mein nirnaya lete hain? Sarkar ne ye Kumbh bana kaise liya? Dharmacharyon ki karyon ka nirnaya aap kaise le loge? (I am asking you, Mr Governor, if you are taking decisions under the influence of any particular political party? How could the government give the festival the status of Kumbh? How could you take a decision on matters that should have been left to religious gurus?”
The seer’s outburst left everyone present stunned. The Shankaracharya explained that Hindu scriptures such as Vedas and Puranas recognise only four Kumbhs (holy dips at the confluence of the rivers), at Ujjain, Nasik, Hardwar and Prayag. “Dips in the confluences of all rivers in the country cannot be accorded the status of Kumbh,” the agitated seer said, making it clear that he, for one, does not favour the mixing of politics and religion.
Racing against time
Just before the announcement of the election dates and the imposition of the model code of conduct, Samajwadi Party leaders in Uttar Pradesh were scurrying around from one populist event to another. While party president Mulayam Singh Yadav was busy organising and addressing caste conferences, his son and Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, was working overtime laying foundation stones and attending felicitation ceremonies.
In a single day, Akhilesh attended five different functions at one-hour intervals in which he inaugurated projects, laid foundation stones, honoured sportspersons, distributed awards and did everything possible under the sun to woo different sections of society.
The senior Yadav flagged off OBC rallies and addressed Brahmin conferences (Prabuddha Sammelan) and Muslim conferences (Ulema Conference) — the names have been ca-mouflaged to escape the court ban on caste rallies. The father-son duo had no time for party workers and candidates who wanted to have a word with them. An SP candidate remarked, “At this rate, father and son will tire out even before the elections begin. They do not realise that this last minute wizardry is not going to benefit the party. They would do better to sit down with candidates and sort out issues related to the party.”
Cat’s whiskers
Such is the heady fervour of an election season for active politicians that they often display their best and worst sides while tackling challenges facing them. Lalu Prasad Yadav, one of India’s most colourful politicians, is known for both his verbal and gestural creativity ranging from the plain funny and witty to the downright cheeky and awful.
With his party Rashtriya Janata Dal having met crushing losses in recent polls and out of power in Bihar for eight years, Mr Yadav is now a man in a hurry with a heavy task before him. The RJD chief knows how damaging his archrival and chief minister Nitish Kumar’s long-running statewide campaign for special category status for Bihar can be for the RJD’s chances of success in the Lok Sabha polls. So Mr Yadav is keen to tell voters it is not within Janata Dal (United) stalwart Kumar’s powers to bring the coveted status for Bihar.
Commenting on Mr Kumar’s tactic of mobilising voters of all castes by his special status campaign, a miffed Yadav picked out a metaphor from the animal world. “Billi order de baghwa ko?” (Can a cat pass an order to a tiger?”) he asked the day the JD(U) implemented a statewide shutdown with this demand. “The Centre can only grant this. The cat is fooling the people by passing orders to the tiger,” he explained, terming the JD(U) bandh a flop. Mr Kumar, himself the owner of an equally witty and sarcastic phraseology, was just too busy to react. But Shyam Razak, a minister in Mr Kumar’s Cabinet, said: “People no longer care about paper tigers.”
Workshop for newcomers
There was some criticism of Mamata Banerjee’s decision to field nearly 10 non-political candidates from different spheres of life. Many people frowned at her choice to nominate Tollywood actors Dev, Moon Moon Sen, Sandhya Roy and singers Soumitra Roy and Indranil Sen. “What do they know about politics? These actors just spout dialogues on the screen and will be lost when they will have to make a political speech at a public rally,” a Communist Party of India (Marxist) central committee member had claimed.
Perhaps he had underestimated Ms Banerjee’s political acumen. She conducted a workshop for these at her Kalighat home and unveiled comprehensive guidelines for the election campaign. The advisory chalked out by Didi was so detailed that it also included the advice to wake up early and drink a lot of water in scorching summer. She even gave a few tips on how to start and end a speech.
“Didi also told us that before signing off we must seek people’s aashirwad and dua,” a rookie candidate from South 24 Parganas said. A booklet detailing the achievements of Ms Banerjee’s government in the past three years is also being distributed so that they can highlight the plus points in the run up to the Lok Sabha polls. “Didi is a genius. She is one of the greatest political leaders, a brilliant painter, a powerful writer and a remarkable orator. She had therefore no difficulty in scripting a complete manual for the election campaign for her party candidates,” he added.
