After Abhishek Manu Singhvi’s alleged sex CD, CDs of two big politicians who were BJP’s lawyers is being talked about. It is speculated that the CDs may hit the market anytime soon.

It is still not final if S S Ahluwalia will be nominated for the Rajya Sabha from Jharkhand. Arun Jaitley, Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh and a large section of several other party members are not in favour of his nomination. On the other hand, Sushma Swaraj and Advani are strongly in favour of Ahluwalia. But neither Advani nor Sushma have anything to do with the politics in Jharkhand, and those who have a stake in it are twiddling their thumbs. Arun Jaitley seems to be quite assured that post of deputy member in in the Rajya Sabha, a post that once belonged to Ahluwalia will now be Ashok Javdekar’s. Wonder why Jaitley will just not become a little soft on Ravi Shankar Prasad.

AICC, that is, the All India Congress Committee is ready for a major reshuffle. The reports of the Anthony Committee that was formed to study the reasons for the party’s dismal performance in the past Assembly elections are out. The state heads are going to have to pay a price. Digvijay Singh was in-charge of UP, Virendra Singh of Uttarakhand and Delhi, and Gulchain Singh Chanak of Punjab. Apart from that it is said that Rahul Gandhi is in favour that UP’s three junior ministers RPN Singh, Jitin Prasad and Pradeep Jain should be made a part of the organisation. Due to the UP debacle, ministers such as Shriprakash Jaiswal, Beni Prasad Sharma and Salman Khurshid may find their wings clipped.

Manmohan Singh’s meeting with Akhilesh Yadav went pretty nicely. The prime minister agreed to almost all the demands made by Akhilesh and also directed the relevant ministers to assist Akhilesh and UP government in whichever way that they can. Two things can become clear from this. One that in the days to come, the SP may be a part of the Manmohan Singh Cabinet, and Mulayam Singh may be the country’s next defence minister. On the other side, Akhilesh is also avoiding attacking Rahul or the Congress directly, so much so that he has not included anyone from Amethi and Rae Bareli from the SP in his Cabinet. This also indicates that in the next Lok Sabha elections, the SP and the Congress may contest as allies.

After assessing his loss, Rahul conceded two things with all his heart – that the organisational structure of the party was extremely weak in the state. There is a need to organise it from bottom to top. Two, the party will to increase its vote bank among castes. About this, Bhola Pandey got up and said that the Brahmin voter was angry with the Congress. There was a secretary Brahmin and he was removed, too. To this, Rahul retorted, “Am I not a Brahmin?” Later there was a lot of discussion about this line in the media.

Those people who are observing Rahul keenly have been noticing his slumped shoulders and changed body language. Maybe that is the reason why the moment UP election results were out, Rahul boarded a Thai Airways flight on March 8 and went to Bangkok and then the Philippines for scuba diving. He was away in Europe recently. Now Sonia wants that Rahul’s self-confidence and aura be restored. During an analysis of the party’s loss in UP elections, most Congressmen blamed Team Rahul’s westernised thinking, their political immaturity and lack of experience. So Sonia Gandhi and her loyalists believe that Rahul’s army of young ministers in the Central government, such as Jitin Prasad, RPN Singh, Pradeep Jain and so on should be made to serve the organisation and loudmouths in UP, such as Beni Prasad, Shriprasad Jaiswal and Salman Khurshid should be kept on a tight leash.

Gadkari is a tad worried that all the political initiatives taken by him these days are having a contrary effect. There was a lot of egg on his face regarding everything from the UP elections, Babu Singh Kushwaha to Angshuman Mishra’s Rajya Sabha post. Although Gadkari wanted to attract voters from backward castes by bringing in Kushwaha, and spent a lot of time, money and effort in the UP elections, but all the attempts failed because of a paucity of leadership. Angshuman Mishra is included among the old loyalists of the Sangh and the party. The way he helped the party fund in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections and the recently-concluded UP elections is for everyone to see. Despite that, there was much ruckus about his name from the BJP that he had to withdraw his name.

The latest news is that Aveek Sarkar-controlled Star News may have its name changed. It is heard that for some time, there has been a tussle about royalty payment between Murdoch, who controls Star TV, and Anand Bazar Patrika’s, which co-owns the channel. If the tussle isn’t resolved, Star may take back its name and logo and the Anand Bazar people may have to relaunch the channel under a new name and identity. And if the agreement is called off, Star cannot launch a new news channel in India for the news one-and-a-half years.

Rajan S Katoch is the new chief of ED, and hails from Himachal Pradesh. It was actually his turn to head ED, and it is a mere coincidence that Congress Secretary Digvijay Singh is his uncle (Phupha); Katoj is Mrs Digvijay Singh’s nephew.

The former chief minister of Uttarakhand Ramesh Pokhriyal was there for the swearing-in ceremony for Vijay Bahuguna. Gauging the sticky situation, the BJP high command called all its Assembly members to Delhi, where Gadkari organised a lavish meal for them and then sent them directly to Bhopal. Nishank anyways has five Assembly members. Understanding the gravity of the situation in the state, the BJP is still dreaming of having its rule there.