Amit Shah’s sudden return to Delhi leaving his Kerala rendezvous midway fuelled zillions of speculations. But, the fact is that he returns to attend a closed-door meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to discuss the fallout of Centre’s economic policies. It was a marathon meeting. Shah told Jaitley that signals from the ground in Gujarat were rather disturbing. Traders from Vadodara, Surat and Ahmedabad were openly opposing the government policies. There was one moment when the two stalwarts had a verbal dual in presence of Modi. Finally, the tri agreed on managing crises by lowering GSP on 28-29 goods besides cutting VAT on petrol and diesel. It was mainly in view of impending Gujarat Assembly polls that the Government lowered GST rates on routine Gujarati snacks like Aam Papad and Khakra from 18 to 5 per cent. Keeping mind Surat’s textile industry, GST on Zari was reduced to 5 and on yarn, filament and fibres the duty was reduced from 18 to 12 per cent. Government is apparently
waiting for people’s response to the sops that is what is delaying Election Commission’s announcement of election dates. BJP MP Shatrughan Sinha has in his own inimitable style given a new definition of GST – Gayeel Tohaar Sarkar (Your Govt is bound to fall).

Everything isn’t well between the Sultan of Delhi and Maharani of Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje. That is why when Prime Minister Modi reached Udaipur recently to inaugurate Rs 15 thousand road project, he overlooked the Chief Minister Raje and instead started talking to Ghanshyam Tewari who is a known Raje detractor ostensibly because Tewari’s constituency was to be the main beneficiary of these projects. The Same scene was witnessed on the stage too. While Raje was addressing the public meeting, PM was busy leafing through a magazine. Who knows better than Modi about what lays in store for her now.

BJP is in power at the Centre for over three years now. It’s expanding rapidly grabbing state after state. The RSS should be happy at its growth curve. Yet, not everything is fine between the BJP and its mother organization, the RSS, an example of which was seen at a dinner organized at Union Minister Nitin Gadkari’s residence recently. Besides Mohan Bhagwat half a dozen people including senior functionaries like Suresh Joshi were invited to the sit-in dinner. Bhagwat is learnt to have expressed his concerns at some of the government policies especially the economic ones. This was not taken kindly to by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He seems to be already reeling under the fusillade launched by Arun Shourie and Yashwant Sinha. That is why he reacted sharply when Bhagwat expressed concern over people losing jobs. Modi is learnt to have said that he is PM of the country had the right to make decisions and face their consequences. Bhagwat got so upset at Modi’s belligerence that he left the meal midway and went to another room. The tension between Sangh and its affiliated organizations is now getting reflected in their working as well. Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh has decided to oppose Modi Government’s economic policies in the same way as RSS chief Bhagwat did.

Media always revelled in its role of a watchdog. But, in the fast-changing socio-political milieu, media role too is undergoing a change. It is soon turning out to be a pool of those in power. Amit Shah was invited recently by one of the largest Hindi newspapers of the country for a free-wheeling interaction with its senior editors. As was customary for them, a tape recorder was switched on at the outset itself to record the proceedings for exact reproduction. After the instructions were over, Shah switched off the Dictaphone. When somebody put up an uncomfortable question, Shah ducked the bouncer by snapping, “Your senior editors know what will go into print”. When a senior editor asked his reaction to cow slaughter, he shot back, “PM has already clarified nobody should be harassed in the name of cow protection. I endorse the same”. The newspaper after preparing the report of this media exchange, duly sent it to Amit Shah’s office for approval. To their utter astonishment, the approved version contained some questions, which had not been put up in the meeting.

Forthcoming Gujarat Assembly elections have become a prestige issue for both Narendra Modi and Amit Shah. That is why they are taking care of even minutest of happenings. It was being heard that International President of Vishwa Hindu Parishad Dr Pravin Togadia was upset with BJP and had shortlisted 40 Assembly seats in Gujarat where he could influence the poll outcome. Hearing about it, Team Shah started its damage control mission. First, they tried to cajole Togadia but when he refused to budge, they brought the RSS leadership in the picture. RSS sources confide that Togadia has been restrained from moving out of Gujarat and has been asked to strengthen the BJP. It’s clear that the RSS is supporting Modi-Shah team to the hilt and is hell-bent on changing the adverse scenario the party is facing right now.

BJP’s young MP Anurag Thakur is disappointed these days. He had been informed by one of the top ministers before the reshuffle that he is being included in the Modi cabinet as MoS (Independent Charge). Thakur immediately mobilised his supporters to move to Delhi. Many of them rushed from Himachal and Punjab. They gave the contract to a top advertising agency to put up more than 100 outdoor hoardings which were to read ‘New India Congratulates Anurag Thakur on being included in the union Cabinet’ alongside a smiling photograph of the young MP. But somehow he could not be included in the Cabinet. The hoardings could not be put up. But Anurag is not the one to take things lying down. He told his supporters that his place was in Himachal and not Delhi. So, they planned a grand roadshow for Anurag. It was planned that first, he will reach Chandigarh from Delhi and then will drive down from Solan to Shimla in a 500 cars cavalcade. Somehow, this was leaked out to Union Minister JP Nadda. He got in touch with organizing secretary of Himachal who in turn issued a diktat for everyone not to join Anurag’s show and anyone seen in the road show should not expect party’s ticket in the forthcoming election. So, when Anurag landed at Chandigarh, he found only six cars had turned up to receive him. Road Show idea bit the dust.

Former Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram is on the target Modi government. Investigative agencies are tightening the noose around his son Karthi Chidambaram. During his reign in power, he had always been vociferous against the BJP. But this time when his son is likely to be put behind the bars, Chidambaram sought an appointment with Sonia and Rahul. He was worried about lack of support from both the Congress and its leaders. He tried to speak to Sonia on phone but she did not take his call. PC even tried to meet Rahul Gandhi 3 days before Rahul left for America but in vain. This infuriated Chidambaram so much that he sent a very strongly worded epistle to the Congress President which said, ‘if my son goes to jail it would not be good for anybody neither you, the party and nor the Gandhi family.’
Chidambaram wrote that as a Minister whatever he did was on the directives of Gandhi Family. But he can not abandon his son when latter is in trouble. There was a clear sound of rebellion in the letter. But before the rebellion could take shape Chidambaram was summoned by 10 Janpath. He was told that he is a very senior leader of the party and such language does not behove him. This was followed by some emotional exchanges. The result was evident the next day when entire Congress Party came forward to differ PC and Karthi both. The party convened a special press conference for the purpose.

After being politically marginalised by Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, the Shiv Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray recently remembered his rebel cousin Raj Thackeray. Incidentally, Raj too is not having a good time of late and he is becoming irrelevant in Maharashtra politics. The tragic part is that Raj’s son is suffering from an incurable disease. This gave an opportunity to Uddhav to visit Raj’s son in the hospital. The brothers forgot their differences and reportedly chatted for a long time. Uddhav asked Raj to return to Shiv Sena’s fold and he could get the number two position in the party. Raj seemed amenable to the idea. After a few days, Uddhav sent two seniors of the party to Raj for the final round of negotiations. The leaders are reported to have put certain conditions before Raj after which he lost his cool. The first condition was that Raj will not get any position in the party or the government for three years after his return to Shiv Sena. Secondly, he could not get any position or tickets for his supporters in any election during this period. Raj told the two leaders that this was not acceptable to him as Shiv Sena simply wants to use his support base but was not ready to give him anything in return. The emissaries have passed on Raj’s message to Uddhav. Now the ball is in his Court. If Uddhav wants to take the move forward he will have to take at least two steps forward.

Inebriated by power, Robert Vadra had caustically remarked that India is a ‘Banana Republic’. Hardly had he known that he too would be at receiving end of Indian’s democracy’s powerful punch. Vadra and his legal team was in for a shock when an English daily from South India, recently published details of land purchased in Bikaner in the name of Vadra’s drivers and servants, for Rs 6 crores. The amount is so big that none of the servants could have owned it. That is why, it easily became a case of money laundering. Before this, Vadra was confident that there was no criminal case against him. But, the newspaper has also published the documents showing transactions made to buy these properties. Obviously, newspaper got these documents from investigating agencies. Now, Vadra may be questioned by the agencies in November. Government in not in a hurry to put him behind the bars since Gujarat elections are due in next few months. Modi and Shah don’t want to let Congress earn any sympathy by sending Vadra to jail before the polls. Government is set to take some big steps after the elections. FIR is also likely to be registered against Vadra’s acolyte Sanjay Bhandari in defence deals. Vadra too may be put in the docks over land deals in Haryana. Future doesn’t appear bright for the Son-in-Law.

Rahul Gandhi is gearing up for coronation which is likely to take place any day before 100th birthday of his grandmother Indira Gandhi on November 19. Senior Congress leaders like Veerappa Moily, have already started giving statements to that effect as well. The biggest challenge before Rahul is to generate funds for an almost empty coffer of the Congress party. For he knows it well that he urgently needs funds if he has to put up a semblance of challenge to Modi-Shah duo in 2019. That was the purpose of his US visit as well. Their target was to raise $ 10 million. His core team was in constant touch with Sam Pitroda, who heads Congress’s Overseas wing. Pitroda is learnt to have already made it clear to him that it wouldn’t be possible for him to raise such a big amount this time. His reason was simple that among the overseas Indians, only two groups owned maximum money – Sikhs and Gujaratis. The former had distanced from Congress after 1984 anti-Sikh riots while Gujaratis don’t want to fund anyone other than Modi. The core team therefore, proposed fund-raising dinner with high entry tickets. But, this could not succeed.