Municipal elections are set to happen in Gujarat but the Congress and BJP have made it a prestige issue. From BJP, all big leaders, be it Sushma Swaraj or Arun Jaitley, all are there for campaigning for the elections. Narendra Modi has visited each municipal seat several times. Congress has also pulled out all plugs of its star campaigners such as Ashok Gehlot, Jaipal Reddy and Rajiv Shukla. The party is also using filmi clout. From Mahima Choudhury to Minissha Lamaba to Isha Koppikar, the glamour quotient is high. There are a few wars of words too. For instance, when Modi said that he will have a statue of Sardar Vallabhai Patel in the state, and which will be bigger than the Statue of Liberty in New York in Gujarat, Congress’ star publicist Rajiv Shukla quipped, “Poor Modi didn’t get a visa to the US. How would he know that people wander inside the State of Liberty wearing shoes? Does Modi want the same fate for Sardar’s statue?” And that Jaswant Singh, who has condemned Sardar in public, is back in the party with all pomp and show. Not only are the arrows flying, they are easing the heartache, too.

Whatever happened to Rahul Gandhi’s dreams of Youngistan? The way his young brigade seems to be failing at every step is a matter of concern to Congress. Sonia wanted to handover Kashmir to Farukh, but Rahul didn’t budge and wanted Omar to be the one. Today, matters in Kashmir couldn’t have been worse. Look at Omar’s body language and talk and you will see how much they denote his mentality. During Ghulam Nabi’s tenure, there was a time when foreign tourists had started visiting Kashmir. Look at how delicate the situation there is today. How the young brigade has fared in the Parliament is there for all to see. Young ministers like Jitin Prasad are being suspected of grave corruption. The situation is such that recently, four of Youth Congress’ presidents in four states have been suspended. For ticket distribution in Bihar for the elections, Rahul’s young party members have created history in being pushy. One wonders how Rahul redress his errors now.

The daughter of IPS Neeraj Kumar of the 76 cadre is a trained dancer. So when she had a performance recently at an auditorium in Delhi, bureaucrats as well as politicians were seen there. The act may well be looked upon as a PR exercise by Kumar since in the next few months, Delhi’s Police Commissioner Dadwal is due to finish three years of his tenure. The government is also looking for his successor. Dadwal per se is not ambitious. He has won high praise for the security arrangements in the capital during the Commonwealth Games and is now eyeing a post with the CBI. Neeraj Kumar has the silent support of the entire Kayastha lobby. He has a long list of supporters even in the BJP – from Shatrughn Sinha and Ravi Shankar Prasad to Yashwant Sinha. But this is probably the one thing that may go against him. But oblivious to all this, Kumar can be seen actively lobbying his case in the PMO and the home ministry. But there are several other names contending for the same post, for instance, BK Gupta, who is the DG at Tihar, and Ajay Chaddha, an able officer of the 1977 batch.

BCCI is all set to file a criminal case against Lalit Modi. During the IPL, Modi had a contract with a watch company to sell its watches, but the company managed to sell only 35 during the entire tournament, out of which 24 are still with Modi. The company hasn’t got any money for the same. According to records, Lalit Modi had a contract of Rs 35 crore with Colors channel, but the channel says Rs 5 crore was orally forgone by Modi. He is also said to be responsible for helping former Vice President Ravikant’s son Rashmikant’s company “Joom” making huge profits. Modi had given Rashmikant’s company Rs 45 crore as advance and promised to pay Rs 35 crore as rentals which was to increase annually. The BCCI has annulled the deal. So now Modi will have to come to India from London for the court hearings, failing which India can asked London to grab Modi under the extradition treaty, for which Interpol’s services will be used. Modi’s days of difficulties are only going to increase.

Who is BJP’s new Pramod Mahajan? Piyush Goyal indeed. He has come as a rescuer for Gadkari. Whether it is about Jharkhand or the problem of power balance, he has proven himself on every front. He is spotted with Vijay Mallya nowadays, whether it is flights or at political venues. Now it is no longer a secret that Piyush Goyal had a crucial role to play in having Mallya win the Rajya Sabha seat by support from the BJP party.

BJP’s culture of pamphlets and hand bills is an old one. And party’s own established leaders covertly distribute pamphlets and CDs about their own party members and involvement in scandals and scams. The newest case in about Uttarakhand Chief Minister Nishank. His alleged involvement in scams is being relished and discussed in political corridors. Not surprisingly, Nishank camp is hurt by all this and is trying to tell the top party leaders in sign language that this is the doping of none other than Koshyari.

Long-forgotten tantric swami Chandraswami is still recuperating his health. He was down with swine flue recently and had to be put in an ICU unit of a five-star healthcare facility in Delhi for weeks. When he felt a little better, he was transferred to the ashram. But no VIP came to ask about his health issues despite falling gravely ill. What a turn of events!

BJP’s chief Nitin Gadkari’s attention is now on changing the face and image of the party. There’s a new-found-found favour for transparency, right attitude and correct behavior. It has thus been decided that BJP will have a trust where both policy and money will be white. The movement has been initiated in Delhi and the initiative has been taken by the newly-elected chief in Delhi Vijendra Gupta. His target is to collect Rs 10 crore. In his frenzy, Gupta has already collected Rs 1 ½ crore by making active members. An active party member has to register himself as the member by handing out a cheque of Rs one lakh. A programme was organized at Venkaiah Naidu’s residence. On the stage were present Venkaiah, Vijay Kumar Malhotra, Vijendra Gupta and Piyush Goyal as a representative of the party president. All BJP post-holders, workers, and Delhi party members were each asked how many members they will be able to make. A zonal party leader said, “I will be able to make at least four.” Piyush was miffed and said, “You are a chairman and will make only 4? We are expecting you to make at least 25. We will have to think a 100 times before making you a president next time.” All party members there were shocked. What kind of political clean dealings was the party leader trying to bring in through the members?

It looks like BJP’s caustic attacks on Rahul will stop for the time being. Now even if the respected party president sees no special powers in Rahul, he can’t say something. A clear message has been sent to BJP leaders from Mohan Bhagwat that they shouldn’t say anything negative about Rahul. The Sangh head says that Rahul hasn’t been tested until now, but he talks nice. And anyways, with Lok Sabha elections three-and-a-half years away, an attack on Rahul would be premature. Maybe the BJP leaders will take heed to what the Sangh leader said.

There is no dearth of speakers in BJP, who are obsessed about being printed and quoted. So while Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitely held a press conference as Opposition spokespersons at the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, the party’s main spokesperson Ravi Shankar also announced a press conference at the party office. It was small stage with one sole chair which was occupied by Ravi Shankar. The other party leaders were in a fix as to when they will get their chairs. Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Tarun Vijay, Prakash Javadkar were standing in a line waiting for their chairs to be put. Prasad then told his assistance to place three chairs below the dais for the speakers. Rudy’s assistant told him to put the chairs on the stage itself. Shankar’s assistant knew what Shankar would have preferred and quipped that the dais was weak and wouldn’t take the weight of so many. Rudy was obviously miffed and left the press conference grumbling.