It is possible that the much-awaited expansion of Manmohan Singh’s Cabinet will take place on September 10. Crossing paths with Ambani senior is going to cost dearly to Petroleum Minister Jaipal Reddy. There is speculation that due to extreme pressure from Mukesh Ambani, the petroleum ministry may be taken from Reddy and he may be made the sports minister. Ghulam Nabi Azad may be the new petroleum minister in his place. There is another possibility that power ministry may be taken from Vyalar Ravi and given to Azad. And because the current Parliament session will last until September 6, September 10 may be chosen as the date for the expansion. Several big portfolios are without a head – the ministry of heavy industries because of the sudden death of Vilasrao Deshmukh, the textile ministry because of Dayanidhi Maran and the names of Kanhimozhi and T R Baalu’s names are being pushed forward for the same. The names of other two DMK Parliamentarians, namely A K M Vijayan and T K Ilagovan are also floating. Apart from them, the other people who are hoping to be made ministers include Vilas Muttemar, Gurudas Kamat, Priya Dutt, K Rehman Khan, Oscar Fernandes, Janardan Diwedi, Chiranjeevi, Manish Tiwari, Manik Tagore and Kanipuram Vishvanath.

Why is Mamata didi so angry with the judiciary? It is believed that she was pretty hurt when the court had given a ruling in favour of the Tatas over the Singur matter. If didi gets hurt, there is no way she won’t give it back.

It is said that the Underworld had a hand in the Mumbai procession. The D company has ISI’s full support for the same. The reason Pakistan is playing up the issue of Bangaldeshi Muslims in the northeast backdrop is so that the world’s focus shifts from the fact that atrocities are being done on the Hindus in Pakistan –news that made ripples in the media. To an extent, Pakistan has succeeded. It has probably happened for the first time that the mob in the procession managed to seize weapons from the police.

Kurian is sure to become the deputy chairman of Rajya Sabha and it is only the Maratha man Sharad Pawar who is standing in his way. The animosity goes back 14 years, when Kurian and Pawar were at loggerheads. Five names were to be given for a Rajya Sabha panel and Pawar gave the names of Chacko and Sangma. Kurian accepted only one name –Sangma’s — from Pawar’s application and cut out Chacko’s name. Pawar was deeply peeved with that and has taken the matter to heart.

To prove its loyalty to dear friend America, the UPA government has repeated its intentions of introducing FDI in retail. The country’s respected prime minister, who is known for his US love, has assured his bosses there that no matter who kicks up a storm – the SP or Mamata –FDI will surely be introduced in retail. And for this, a Bill may not even be introduced in the Parliament in the coming session; just a notification can be made to bring it into action and the new policy may be announced.

Former Sangh head and 82-year-old K S Sudarshan, who is currently living in Mysore with his brother, left his house like every other day at 5.30 am for his morning walk and lost his way. He was about four km from home and kept wandering around in a locality there. Tired, he sat under a tree adjoining a mosque and was grumbling when a young man who worked for a courier company noticed him and took him home with the help of his mother. The man gave him some water and some buttermilk to drink, after which Sudarshan ji slept off. Around noon, the man saw the news of former Sangh head going missing on a Kannada channel and he called up and told them Sudarshan was at his home. It was then that people found out that Sudarshan ji is suffering from dementia, which leads to people forgetting things about themselves.

“Tu itney kareeb hai ki tujhe dekhoon to kaise/ thodi si alag ho to tere chehre ko dekhein” (You are so close to me that I can’t even see you/ Come away from me a little so I may see your face). It’s almost like the UPA government and scams have become two sides of the same coin. The newest scam to come to light is that of the Rajya Sabha TV and it came to light in the fresh report by Director General of Audit, Central Revenues. The report talks about several issues but one of the cases is about the optical fibre connectivity (OFC) and worth Rs 70,70,000. The best part is that the officials gave away the project to a private company City Com at its asked-for price without bothering to take the tender route. This job did not include any agreement that was signed, and neither was a performance guarantee sought from the company. It is worth mentioning that the same company was given the contact to lay down IP and phone lines inside Parliament House – again without a tender. Incongruities were also noticed in equipment hiring for Rajya Sabha TV, and Rs 85 lakh was spent annually on this. Apart from this, no TDS was deducted for any of the services because of which Rajya Sabha TV lost Rs 48 lakh last year. There is a lot that is wrong in taxi fares – these alone are nothing less than Rs 60 lakh.

Sources reveal that P A Sangma, who was supported by the BJP for the Presidential post will soon form a local political party in the north east. Sangma has also assured the BJP leaders that his party will be an important part of the NDA. .

When it comes to talking about conscience, it is only fitting we talk about the BJP here. It doesn’t matter what opinion BJP’s eloquent leader and BJP’s Opposition leader in the Lok Sabha thinks about UPA’s announcement of Hamid Ansari as the vice-presidential candidate. Several prominent leaders of her own party such as Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitely seem to be in favour of the decision. Both leaders are of the opinion that as Rajya Sabha speaker, Ansari conducted the Upper House with great efficiency. So is it possible that the BJP’s conscience will be heard in the elections for the vice-president?

In the mayhem of political chaos, the expansion of the Cabinet has been postponed. Information from sources reveals that the same may happen in September and big expansion of the Manmohan Singh government is on the cards then. On the cards is farewell to a few ministers and a few new faces may be introduced. To take care of the present political scenario, ministries may be changed. A notification may be passed soon before the Monsoon Session of the Parliament. Most eyes are focused on the finance ministry. Chidambaram is ahead of the race for the same but our economist prime minister doesn’t seem to be in a mood to hand over the finance ministry to anyone else for now. He wants that the next Union Budget be presented under his leadership.