Cabinet reshuffle is in the offing. It is possible anytime before September 3, when PM Modi will embark on a China visit to participate in BRICS Summit. He will return on September 7 while pitra paksha will start from 5 and will end only on 20 September. One is supposed to avoid this period for any good work. It appeared expansion would take place on 25 August after Amit Shah cancelled his Chennai visit, then people expected it to take place on 27 when Lalu Yadav’s RJD rally was organised in Patna. BJP would have liked the media to be full of expansion stories and all reports of the rally would be treated as secondary stories. But, in the meantime violence broke out after Ram Rahim’s arrest. Now, it remains to be seen when Modi will plan his cabinet expansion to ensure maximum coverage of the event.

Those who have got new suits stitched in anticipation of a Cabinet berth, include Vinay Sahasrabuddhe, who is known to be an RSS organiser. Powers that be have asked him to stay put in Delhi. AIADMK’s Thambidurai, who is Deputy Speaker of Lok Sabha, too is learnt to have received similar instructions. The expansion was expected to take place on 25th August on the auspicious day of Ganesh Chaturthi. But, Ganesh festival will last for 10 days and expansion can take place anytime next week. If Thambidurai is included in the Cabinet, Deputy Speaker’s post may go to Shiv Sena. But, then what will happen to Karia Munda? Will he too be accommodated in the Cabinet? Another suspense is about JD(U)’s nominees. The party is likely to get one Cabinet Minister and one Minister of State’s post. Nitish Kumar’s nominees are expected to be RCP Singh and KC Tyagi. NCP too is expecting a place in Modi’s cabinet. But, the final decision will be the Prime Minister.

It is understood that Modi will promote some of his cabinet colleagues in view of their better performance. PMO prepares report card of each Minister and points given for various attributes. Good performers naturally are likely to be rewarded. These include people like Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal. Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu is expected to be shifted to Environment. Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari is likely to get Railways. It remains to be seen whether he gets railways as an additional ministry or in place of his existing portfolio. It is also likely that a new composite ministry of surface transport can be created which will include Roads, Shipping and Railways.
It is now well known that the ministers who had been summoned by Amit Shah last time, had to lose their cabinet seat or had been demoted. This time Shah had summoned three ministers for a long chat. It is therefore natural that all these three – Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Chaudhary Birender Singh and Upendra Kushwaha – would be worried about their future.

Aam Aadmi Party which used to croak on almost all subjects under the Sun has suddenly gone silent. No one issued a statement even after a CBI case was registered against senior AAP minister Satyendra Jain. People curious about the reason found out that all news channels have been told by the BJP that no BJP spokesperson will join the debate which has an AAP participant too. So, not wanting to antagonise the ruling BJP, all TV channels have decided to boycott the AAP.

State Governments in Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Delhi had already been warned by intelligence agencies about a possible outbreak of violence in case Dera Sachcha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh was arrested. It is a matter of investigation as to why state governments, especially the Haryana Government headed by Manohar Lal Khattar did not pay heed to this warning. It speaks volumes about Ram Rahim’s political clout. A delegation of BJP leaders and ministers led by Haryana’s senior minister Anil Vij had not called on Ram Rahim on his birthday on August 15 but also presented an amount of Rs 51 lakh as a gift. BJP chief Amit Shah’s photographs seeking Ram Rahim’s blessings by touching his feet have already gone viral. Ram Rahim had reciprocated by congratulating Shah on his victory in Rajya Sabha election last week.
Famous cricketers like Virat Kohli and Shikhar Dhawan are already brand ambassador of Baba. It is a matter to ponder that how such a heinous criminal can be included in the list of 36 most influential Indians and provided Z-category security. A fan of Bollywood movies, Baba used to be the cynosure of all eyes when he used to go out of his 700-acres Dera campus in a cavalcade of more than 100 vehicles. His clout was so much that owner of a small newspaper ‘Pura Sach’ Ram Chander Chhatrapati was killed because he published all black deeds of Ram Rahim. He had published accounts of the Sadhvis who had accused Ram Rahim of repeatedly raping them for years. Chhatrapati after being shot, struggled for life for 22 days, before succumbing. But, police did not record his statement nor did it register a case of murder, because of Ram Rahim’s political clout. The proverbial last straw was Ram Rahim’s glorification by BJP MP Sakshi Maharaj in the name of nationalism. How long will this continue?

Are you aware of 30-feet tall grass being grown in Manohar Parrikar’s Goa and even fruits being harvested from it? Can’t believe? Then kindly read on. Parrikar is keen on the rapid industrialisation of the state. He has constituted an all power Industrial Promotion Board (IPB) for it. Anybody wanted to set up an industry or invest in the state needs to go through the board. But, all these things need land. Majority of empty land in Goa has coconut trees on them and to cut them one requires permission from several agencies including forest and environment. Parrikar has cleverly circumvented the need by reclassifying coconut tree as grass. One can cut as much this new grass as needed as enjoy water as a bonus.

They say that ever since Smriti Irani had been given the additional responsibility of running the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, she has been at it in clearing out old skeletons from the closets. They say also, that during the reign of Venkaiah Naidu as the minister, a small coterie had the run of the place. So much so that when the new serial programmes for the northeast channel, Arun Prabha, were granted, the deciding factor was political proximity rather than the quality of production. Irani is well aware of this and her actions reflect that. The latest is the upcoming International Film Festival of India in November in Goa. Shastri Bhawan sources coo that this is why Irani has shown the door to the 21-member screening committee, most of whom were Naidu’s political handmaids. Though that earlier committee had reviewed some 150 foreign films, sources say that Irani has set up her own committee of those she considers film industry veterans. They say also that she wants to hack the prize money for the festival winners. It is known that as much as Rs 40 lakh used to be the prize money for the winner of the Golden Peacock (best foreign film) segment. But apparently, Irani feels that instead of draining out such a lot of money on foreign film directors, it is better spent on Indian ones who make films on ‘socially relevant’ subjects. The ‘golden’ question, however, is, is the entrenched babudom in Shastri Bhawan ready to implement such ‘novel’ ideas?

Sharad Yadav was overwhelmed by the reception he got when he reached Patna when he reached Patna for the first time after his political divorce with Bihar CM Nitish Kumar. “Sharad Yadav Zindabad” resounded from the air from the massive crowd. That was in the first week of August. In fact, he was having a tough time even reaching his waiting car. Then suddenly, the crowd started chanting Lalu Yadav Zindabad and Tejaswi Yadav Zindabad. That is when one realised that the show had been stage-managed by the Rashtriya Janata Dal of Lalu. Then on August 19, when Nitish’s Janata Dal United (JDU) was to hold its national convention, Sharad too convened the convention of his closet members as the ‘genuine’ JDU. He passed a stricture, though that at his convention, RJD supporter would throng but no one would raise slogans supporting RJD or Lalu. Neither would RJD flags be allowed inside. But then, the ‘discipline’ of RJD members is fabled!

Now famous for its propensity of rattling out numbers, the Modi government has tripped on its own GON, Game of Numbers. In the unending controversy about demonetization, when the finance minister Arun Jaitley was asked about the benefits, he stumped everyone by saying that due to demonetization, 91 lakh new tax payers have come into the net. On the face of this, now resigned former NITI Aayog deputy chief Arvind Panagariya had told a newspaper that number of new tax payers was 5.8 lakhs, or close to one-twentieth of Jaitley’s dream figure. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Red Fort on Independence Day on August 15, multiplied Panagariya a mere ten times and said that number of new tax payers was 58 lakh. But it was still half of what Jaitley had claimed. Interestingly, where is all the new tax money, given that the Reserve Bank of India has halved its coffers to the Union government this year?

When the social media went on fire with the news that Leftist Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar’s Independence Day speech had been blacked out of All India Radio and Doordarshan, a BBC correspondent called Sarkar up from Delhi asking about his comments. Sarkar was completely nonchalant about this. When the BBC scribe asked if Sarkar was planning any protest against this censorship, Sarkar said: “You are better placed, being in Delhi. Why don’t you ask our party general secretary Sitaram Yechury what the party is palling to do?” And thus saying, Sarkar disconnected. Truly, politics has gotten silenced.