At the same time, the moot question is: Will the Congress win back this lost ground only on the basis of a prominent winnable name? Congress strategists are devising ways to go back to its old vote bank. This includes the traditional voters that had voted for the Congress in the past – Brahmins, Dalits, Muslims, and, to some extent, the backwards castes. Prashant Kishore’s core strategy is to form a coalition under Congress’ leadership; it is being said that Lalu and Nitish are ready to be a part of the coalition. Congress’ talks with Ajit Singh are also at a decisive juncture, and Anupriya Patel’s mother, too, is keen on joining this fourth front. The Congress is also in talks with smaller parties such as the Peace Party. It Ajit favours the coalition, the Jat voters might, once again, lean towards the Congress. After his win in Bihar, Nitish Kumar has emerged as the most prominent leaders for the Kurmis; in UP, Kurmis make for 6-7 per cent of the voters. With Lalu entering the battleground, Yadav votes might stand divided, too. Congress’ regional leaders are also bringing back its biggies; for instance, the Saharanpur area is going to Imran Masood, who has an impressive standing among the Muslim community there. The results of the prime minister’s Kisan rally in Bareilly have given a shot in the arm to the Congress’ hopes.

It is said the Congress’ veteran treasurer Motilal Vora is a worried man. Sources say that Prashant Kishore, who is weaving election strategies for the Congress in Punjab and UP, has handed over a list of 250 people to Vora, who will be a part of his team. Two problems now pose in front of Vora – one, where will the 250 people be seated, since even the Congress’ war room in Gurudwara Rakabganj Road doesn’t have that much space. In any case, the government bungalow where this war room was made had been allocated to Hindustan Times’ owner and Rajya Sabha member Shobhana Bhartiya. Two-three days ago, Vora, along with Kishore, did a tour of the Congress’ 24, Akbar Road office to see how these 250 people could be accommodated. The second big problem for Vora is regarding the finances; how will the arrangement for payment of salaries for these people be made? The monthly budget for this falls anywhere between Rs 1.5 crore to Rs 2 crore. The party fund is going through a rough patch, and sources say that each Parliamentarian from the party is donating Rs 1 lakh a month to help the party function. And now Kishore’s team? It’s easy to read the worry lines on Vora’s forehead.

A few days ago, Rahul Gandhi appeared in a new avatar in the Parliament – brimming with self-confidence, taking aim at the prime minister, playing with words, and firing questions at the BJP and Sangh. The words hit their mark with the prime minister, which made him react similarly in the Parliament. Now the question is, how did this change in Rahul’s speech and natural interrogative format come about? Has he really shown the door to his old speech writers such as Mihir Sharma? Sources who claim to be close to him claim that Rahul has now started to learn from his mistakes. Once surrounded by a coterie, Rahul is now also consulting veteran and seasoned party leaders about matters, and is paying attention to what they have to say. Sources also say that only two people are in-charge of fine-tuning Rahul’s speeches and his personality – Priyanka Gandhi and Suman Dubey. Clearly, Rahul not only listens to them, he also walks their talk.

When politics is contaminated with self-delusion, stubbornness, and mistakes, the moves and countermoves on the chessboard start to play out against your favour. The same happened in Kanhaiya’s case. Knowingly or unknowingly, the BJP and Sangh have made an anonymous Kanhaiya into a hero for India’s youth. Would things have been different if Kanhaiya’s name was not Kanhaiya, but Khaled or something else? In our mythological tales, Kanhaiya not only does the Raas, as well as the Leela, and when needed, he proves himself as an able charioteer as well in the battleground. With Kanhaiya, the government’s top brass, too, made some mistakes. He is from a regular Bhoomihar family from Begusarai district in Bihar. The anchors of Bihar’s Mahagathbandhan have decided in a meeting among themselves that Kanhaiya will be the coalition’s candidate from Begusarai in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. It is worth nothing that this is a Bhoomihar-majority seat. Looks like at least Kanhaiya’s Acche Din are about to come.

The sudden death of P K Sangma, a popular politician from the northeast, who was also a former Central minister and speaker, has caused some tensions in the family regarding his political heritage. Sangma ji’s wife wants that just like her father, Agatha Sangma – who has also been a minister at the Centre — should take forward P K Sangma’s political heritage. It is worth noting that it was Agatha’s advice to her father that he should leave his ace seat in Meghalaya. On the other hand, a faction of the party wants the Parliament seat left empty by the father should be filled by his son Conrad Sangma through a by-election. That is because he is active in politics and, at present, also the leader of Opposition in Meghalaya’s Assembly. At the same time, Madam Sangma thinks that the son should concentrate on state politics and the daughter should take care of politics at the Centre.

Words such as cleanliness, transparency, and purity are losing their meaning and importance under the aegis of the most honest prime minister. All that used to happen in the past governments is happening during this government’s tenure as well. Surely, it isn’t a coincidence that the Modi government is also trying to look after the vested interests of its favoured moneybags? Take, for instance, the matter of one man with deep pockets, and who is in the pharma industry. Due to the government’s new drugs policy, his company, which was number two in terms of giving donations to the party for the Lok Sabha elections, is experiencing a great time. According to sources, of the prices of 61 drugs that the Modi government has decontrolled in the past few days, 29 belong to this company. This means that after the government control over the prices of these drugs has been lifted, the company has the freedom to decide the prices itself, and it is doing just that. For instance, the price for TB drugs have been increased more than five times; in this poor country, does a rich man ever get infected with TB? In the US, when a company increased the price of AIDS medicines by 50 times after the government control was lifted off them, the senate there created a big hue and cry about it. The Parliament is functioning in our country, too, but which Parliamentarian is interested in talking about it; after all, companies know how to shut their mouths.

Despite the ruckus, there are full chances that the Budget session will carry on. The Congress too has agreed that disrupting the Parliament every now and then sends a negative signal to the public. When Parliamentary Affairs Minister Venkaiah Naidu could not handle the Opposition, our famous PM, who does not show too much interest in Parliamentary affairs, sprung to action. When he sent an invitation to meet Congress party President Sonia Gandhi, it was accepted. The meeting took care of complains and grievances; Sonia’s main grouse was that the BJP and Sangh were attacking her personally, and in the same vein, the National Herald matter was being used according to their own convenience. The PM talked about mutual respect and maintaining relationships, and it worked. Sonia requested the PM he should become more active in relation to Parliamentary affairs, because his ministers have failed in connecting with Opposition parties and have not been able to establish a dialogue with them. Sources that the Congress has given a green signal about GST as well; it wants three amendments to the bill, of which the BJP is agreeable to two. Thus, when the next phase of the Budget session starts, the chance that the GST will be passed are high.

Smriti Irani, who with her irrefutable arguments, emotional stance, aggressive behaviour, and disarming words unarmed the Opposition benches, is the new star of Modi durbar. Sources say some pandit has advised Irani to keep something red on herself before she leave home, or wear a red bindi at the very least, and her aura will go through a positive change. Armed with the glow of red, Irani has also emerged as a favourite with Sangh. Sources say Sangh’s BJP prabhari Krishna Gopal played a big role in preparing Irani’s speech and getting her the relevant documents about the JNU matter. Human resources minister has always been an important ministry for the Sangh. The reason is clear and the Opposition also knows that it is the education sector that can script future politics. Now if this gives rise to the claims of saffronisation of the education sector, it’s quite all right. After all, when did the UPA worry about it either?

Due to an unannounced war waging between Jats and non-Jats regarding Jats’ demand for reservation, State Minister for Defense Rao Indrajit Singh asked three of his colleagues from Haryana over for tea at his office. Incidentally, of these three Parliamentarians, one was a Brahmin, the other Punjabi and the third, a Saini. When the Parliamentarians reached Mr Rao’s office, they were surprised to see Mr Minister’s workstation was sparkling clean and without any files. Not only where there no files, you couldn’t even find a scrap of paper there. They wanted to know whether Mr Rao really has no work as a minister. Do no files come to him? The Parliamentarians were told it was hardly a matter of surprise, and that his senior Manohar Parikkar’s room was even cleaner. Is this the result of Modi’s Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, or is the PMO handling all defense ministry matters itself?

Lok Sabha TV has a lot of research work to be done, and the company that has been chosen for this work is said to be owned by a BJP spokesperson. He is also said to be close to Arun Jaitley. The research is worth Rs 12 lakh every month, and the BJP spokesperson’s company filed a tender for Rs 9.5 lakh. The second tender for Rs 2.5 lakh is from an opinion poll agency that is run by an election analyst who is close to the BJP. When the analyst came to know about the enormity of the work, he became adamant on the fact that since his company has experience in similar work, a major part of the work should come to him, or the tender should be cancelled. Sources say the Lok Sabha TV, too, has decided to cancel the tender, and that it has received orders from above that the entire project should be given to the company run by the BJP spokesperson. The coming days might see this instruction either being carried out, or being a reason for ruckus.