WIN SOME, LOSE SOME
Newly minted BJP MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar gifted the Indian Air Force with the refurbished Dakota DC 3 VP 905, which was the plane his father, Air Commodore M.K. Chandrasekhar (Retd), flew while in the Air Force. The aircraft was restored from scrap in London and then the sale deed was gifted to the IAF. It’s now formally a part of the Indian Air Force Vintage Flight. Unfortunately, with elections in his home state, Rajeev had to give the induction ceremony a miss. Guess your calendar is just one of the things you lose when you stop being an Independent MP and join a national party!
THE BLAME GAME
Suddenly Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s Twitter handle has come alive. At the fag end of the campaign, he has developed a chutzpah and is taking on both UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweet for tweet. Apart from countering Modi’s allegations of misgovernance in Karnataka, the CM has also developed a sense of humour, such as when he tweeted a cartoon saying, “In case of Emergency, Blame Nehru”. This was in reference to the BJP blaming the Congress’ past for all the problems of the present. The BJP has countered this by saying it’s not Siddaramaiah who is writing his own tweets. But even if these are ghost written, at least the spirit of debate and dialogue is making a return via the Karnataka elections.
LEGALLY SPEAKING
There was an interesting exchange on the sets of the NewsX-The Sunday Guardian RoundTable, where Dr Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Dr Subramanian Swamy were pitted against each other. They also face each other in the various cases Dr Swamy has initiated against various Congress leaders, including the Gandhis. However, before the show started, Dr Singhvi and Dr Swamy were discussing how the latter doesn’t have a legal degree despite all the cases he has initiated. “That’s like having all the power and no responsibility,” joked Dr Singhvi good-naturedly. With the fallout of the impeachment motion still in the air, the point was perhaps closer home than he would have liked!
TEAM RAHUL
Rahul Gandhi may not have gone in for a drastic reshuffle at the organisational level, but he is slowly putting his people in place. It’s not just the PCC chiefs who are being reshuffled, but key members of his team have been given organisational charges of crucial states. R.P.N. Singh has been given charge of Jharkhand, Jitender Singh Bhanwar has been given charge of Odisha, Sushmita Dev has already changed the face of the Mahila Congress ever since she was made the chief; while Madhu Yaskhi Goud has been handed the charge of the most sensitive and high profile task of all—the crucial state of Karnataka. The ex MP from neighbouring Telangana has been camping in the state and, more recently, on our TV channels for the last few months. It will be interesting to see how Team Rahul fares in the tasks allotted to them.