Protege spills the beans: Himanta Biswa Sarma, the erstwhile Congress heavyweight, may have switched sides to the Bharatiya Janata Party, but his “ghost” continues to haunt Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi. Problems began when Mr Sarma, after joining the BJP, started revealing some secret political instances from the time when he was a minister. A visibly upset Mr Gogoi said that he didn’t care for leaders like Mr Sarma. “If he continues to make false allegations I would also reveal his hidden secrets,” retorted Mr Gogoi.
It is more than a week since this statement but Mr Sarma took another pot-shot at Mr Gogoi by narrating an another incident about how the chief minister was humiliated during a visit to Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s residence.
Mr Sarma related an instance when he accompanied Mr Gogoi and Assam PCC chief Anjan Dutta to Mr Gandhi’s residence where they were served tea and biscuits. “Soon we started taking tea, a dog pounced upon the table and took control of biscuits served to the chief minister.”
Mr Gogoi kept smiling and virtually praised the dog, said Mr Sarma, adding that the chief minister did not give that kind of attention to the dissident MLAs who were forced to leave the party. Mr Sarma has been trying to kill two birds with one stone, humiliating Mr Gogoi while attacking the Congress.
CPM’s ascent, Buddha’s descent: Ever since its humiliating defeat in West Bengal in May 2011, the Communist Party of India (Marxist)-led Left front have been desperately trying to turn their fortunes around. However, all efforts by the CPM satraps to galvanise their demoralised cadres and rejuvenate their famed organisational machinery, proved an exercise in futility.
Under Mamata Banerjee’s charismatic leadership the Trinamul has emerged as a formidable force in the state’s polity and the CPM leaders are at their wit’s end trying to find ways to match its strength. But after persistent failures, the CPM, in the past few weeks, succeeded in making its presence felt.
On August 27, the march to Nabanna, organised by peasants’ wings of the Left parties, was undoubtedly a big success. Although Left protesters could not reach the state secretariat, they gave the state police a tough time. A week later, the national trade union strike called by Left-affiliated outfits turned into a Bengal bandh.
Although Ms Banerjee left no stone unturned to foil the bandh, it was a huge success. In fact, after several years, the state witnessed such a successful shutdown.
CPI(M) cadres are elated because top party leaders including Biman Bose, Shyamal Chakraborty, Surjya Kanta Mishra and Gautam Deb are relentlessly hitting the streets highlighting the Mamata government’s failures on various fronts and its involvement in different scams. Surprisingly, in CPM’s hour of glory, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was no where on the scene.
After all, Ms Banerjee came to power in 2011 after dethroning him. A party insider said that Buddha babu has not been keeping well. “The fight has gone out of him. He has become stoic and philosophical. In his new avatar with a white beard which matches his white mane and snow-white attire, Buddha da looks more like a sage than a politician,” he added.
No flattering Harichandan: Senior Congress leader Suresh Kumar Routray has become a silent soldier now, especially after his son-in-law Prasad Kumar Harichandan became the president of the Orissa Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC).
Prior to his son-in-law’s elevation Mr Routray, who is known for his large-heartedness and good sense of humour, used to inspire the party workers in entertaining ways. The frequent change of guard in the OPCC did not affect him for he would immediately get close to the new leader and flank him with his followers.
From former chief ministers J.B. Patnaik, Hemananda Biswal and Giridhar Gamang, to other senior leaders like K.P. Singhdeo and Jayadev Jena, he would shout zindabad for all of them, earning the dubious distinction of being a flatterer. When the reporters recently asked him why he was not seen shouting zindabad for his son-in-law, Mr Routray replied, “I think that phase is over in my case now”.
The grapevine has it that Mr Routray knows Mr Harichandan wouldn’t like to see his father-in-law hankering on with his flattering ways.
Punching above the weight: With the decision on elections to students unions in the state universities still awaited, the wannabe student leaders are now trying their luck in panchayat elections in Uttar Pradesh. More than two dozen students from Lucknow University alone are contesting the panchayat polls.
These students, along with their supporters, have already left for their respective villages to try their luck. According to one such aspiring student leader, a debut in the panchayat polls would be more beneficial to his political career. “You get basic experience of contesting elections and there are no rules here like we have in the university. Since the panchayat polls came before the varsity polls, I thought this was a better option,” he confessed.
Shopkeepers in Lucknow, however, are a harried lot. Most of these student leaders who are contesting the panchayat polls are resorting to extortion from businessmen and the latter are worried that when students’ polls are held, the same students would again demand money which means double trouble for them.
Dengue den: Even as the Union health ministry is leaving no stones unturned in advertising measures to counter dengue, its own building, Nirman Bhavan, may be the breeding ground for the deadly Aedes aegypti mosquito.
The receptionists in the ministry are scared of the “filthy” water filter that is stationed in their area. The water keeps collecting in the container which is kept to store the waste water till it starts dripping down. The receptionists say that a lot of times sweepers are told to check on the accumulation of water, but to no avail. They wonder that people are probably waiting for a dengue outbreak at Nirman Bhavan.
