DK’s Heart Gets Statehood
Does the new D. K. Shivakumar, Chief Minister of Karnataka, speak Hindi? Not that it is an important criterion for his new job, but there is an interesting backstory here. When DK was in judicial custody and incarcerated in Tihar Jail in 2019 for about 50 days, he honed his spoken Hindi skills. In fact during an interaction with the media in Delhi in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha polls he admitted as much that it was thanks to the witch-hunt by the BJP government that he upped his linguistic skills. That led to some speculation amongst the media that DK could be the next Ahmed Patel as the Congress leadership has been using his troubleshooting skills on various occasions. But DK just laughed the suggestion away saying his heart was in his home state. Well, today his heart has found its statehood.
The GYMKHANA CLUB CONTROVERSY
Is the Delhi Gymkhana Club the new vivadit-sthal (disputed site) as Pavan Varma quipped recently? The Union Urban Development Ministry’s notice to the Delhi Gymkhana Club has seemed to have sparked off much debate, both on social media and mainstream channels. One YouTuber has it that the club was the venue for many CIA plots to destabilise the government. Seriously? Is this the narrative that the government wants to encourage? There are other theories, a prime one being that the club case was brought up to distract the headlines away from the Cockroach Janata Party. That led political commentator Tehseen Poonawalla to quip—then was it (the notice) a Hit Job? In fact Tehseen was in fine form when he appeared on the Roundtable (NewsX). When asked if this was not a war against a physical space but against a certain mindspace he asked, “are we heading for One Nation, One Club?” Also on the show was Abhijit Iyer-Mitra, who pointed out that contrary to being the Lutyens elite, if the club got a notice like this only got to show that it was not an elite. In fact, as Yashovardhan Jha Azad, a former special secretary IB noted, “the elite are those who are close to power. Such as Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh who has managed repeated paroles.” All very interesting arguments here. Clearly, the conversation has gone way beyond the club.
WHO WILL BE BENGAL’S FINANCE MINISTER?
This seems to be a crucial post given that one of the reasons why the BJP was swept to power was that the youth were fed up with travelling outside the state for work. Given that the hordes of maids who took leave from their jobs in Gurgaon’s condos to come and vote for the BJP, this is a promise that the new government knows it has to make good. But first, it needs a sharp finance brain at the helm. An obvious choice would have been Ashok Lahiri, but he was co-opted by the NITI Aayog. However, Lahiri’s presence at the Centre is being seen as an advantage for the state in terms of coordination for funds for he will emerge as a key component of the entire double-engine-sarkar model. One name doing the rounds on social media is that of Sanjiv Sanyal (member of the PM’s Economic Advisory Council). Having said that, it would be interesting as to whom the BJP finally zeroes in, for that will be a signal by itself.
