Natwar Singh’s autobiography “One life is not enough” is creating waves in the political circle. The book is being talked about for primarily two reasons – firstly, Natwar’s writing is full of alliteration and secondly, his unique style of story-telling . A source close to Natwar says that when Priyanka and Sonia went to meet this old associate of theirs before the book was printed, Sonia asked him not to mention three incidents. One, when Rahul was held in a US airport with a big amount of currency (dollars) when NDA was in power and Natwar took care of the matter by talking to his friend Brijesh Mishra, who was then the National Security Advisor. Two, when an ambassador and his wife from a Western country had gone for an official meet with Sonia at 10, Janpath, and the ambassador’s wife had made an unkind remark about Sonia’s English. The third incident is when Priyanka and Robert’s married life was on the rocks. Needless to say, Natwar respected all of Sonia’s wishes in the book.

After Dr Karan Singh relinquished his seat as ICCR’s chairman, nearly 80 politicians and bureaucrats are eyeing the seat. Several leaders close to Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj, such as Hema Malini, Kirron Kher, Shahnawaz Hussain who lost the last elections and former governor and former home secretary B P Singh are some of the people vying for the post. The reason for the seat becoming a coveted one is clear – while the ICCR chairman has the same status as a minister, he also gets ample chances to make foreign visits.

Narendra Modi has advised two young and promising ministers in his Cabinet to take a bitter pill even as “acchey din” are being talked about. A few days ago, when Central Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan was seen with prominent industrialist Gautam Adani in a hotel lobby, Modi called Pradhan and warned him, “Such incidents should not happen in the future.” When Energy and Coal Minister for State(independent charge) Piyush Goyal went to meet Modi to ask for permission to attend a corporate summit in London, Modi clearly told him that he already behaved like a representative of the corporate world, and now he should give up his love for it. Needless to say, Piyush Goyal hurriedly cancelled his London trip.

It is probably for the first time that differences between the mother and the son regarding the party and how it should function are coming to the fore. Sources reveal that Congress Chairperson Sonia Gandhi herself wants major changes in the All India Congress Committee and election committees in a big way. On the other hand, Rahul is not in favour of seeing those who he likes, go. For instance, Sonia wants Hemant Biswa Sarma to become the new Assam chief minister in place of Tarun Gogoi. Also, she wants to see Maharashtra’s state President Manik Rao Thackeray and the in-charge of Maharashtra Mohan Prakash go, but Rahul wants to maintain the status quo. While Sonia prefers politicians such as Mallikarjun Khadge, Rahul has a long list of those who lost the last election and who he wants to adjust in the organization, such as P C Chacko, Manik Tagore, Jitendra Singh, Ajay Maken and so on.

After Natwar Singh, Thakur politician Amar Singh is also preparing to open up his can of secrets and is working on an explosive book about his political experiences. Sources close to Amar also claim that he has signed a contract with a big international publishing group and is getting the money he wants for his autobiography. The four chapters the publishers are relying on the most are about Amitabh, Ambani, Mulayam and Saharashri.

The heat is on in Madhya Pradesh’s Vyapam Scam and the matter is something that Delhi’s Nizam knows about. Sources reveal that in the days to come, the Central government is going to hand over the investigations to the CBI so that the grain is separated from the chaff and everything becomes clearer. When UPA-II was in power, the IB was taking extra interest in the scam; IB Chief Asif Ibrahim is known to be close to Digvijay Singh. In any case, Asif Ibrahim has an old Congress connection; he has even been Late Madhav Rao Scindia’s personal secretary, too. It is clear that Diggy Raja must have an extra interest in Shivraj and Suresh (Soni). So he wanted the matter to gain importance and it happened like that, too. But who is gaining from all this? The Shahanshah?

Speculation is rife that after the completion of the current Parliament session on August 14, the much-awaited expansion of Modi’s Cabinet might take place and about a dozen new ministers might add zing to Modi’s government. The big question is if daughter and son politicians will get lucky or not. For instance, Vasundhara’s son Dushyant has given his mother an ultimatum that if she is still unable to make him a minister this time, he will go to his London flat and sulk there. Yashwant Sinha’s foreign returned son is eyeing the state minister for finance’s post and it is said that he is liked by Arun Jaitley as well. It is believed that Yashwant has assured his party people that if his son Jayant becomes a minister at the Centre, he would retire from politics in Jharkhand – a good deal, some might say.

North East MP Forum has chosen P A Sangma as their new president. This July 30, a dinner was organized at his official residence at Aurangzeb Road in New Delhi and North East Parliamentarians were invited. 26 MPs including Central Minister Kiran Rijiju and Sonowal attended the event; it is worth mentioning here that about 40 Parliamentarians from Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha represent North East region. Central Minister for State General V K Singh, who is considered to be a good friend of Sangma’s, also attended the dinner. Mrs Sangma, that is Soradini Sangma, had prepared some of the non-veg dishes from the north east on her own. It was decided on the occasion that people from the north east will spread their food and culture to all states and regions of India and will invite people from other states to come and visit their region. Sangma himself gave a presentation on the occasion on how 10 per cent of the budget from different ministries should be spent on the north east. All preparations are on to apply pressure on Modi about this.

This is possibly the first government at the Centre where the bureaucrats have an upper hand over the ministers; some secretaries in ministries are behaving with the ministers as if they were Modi’s spies and their sole job is to keep an eye on the minister. Several secretaries don’t even think it is important to send important files to the ministers and several are making negative comments about their own ministers’ files. When a veteran minister arrived in Panchvati to give a presentation to the Prime Minister, he was shocked to see that his PS had changed the entire presentation that had been approved by him. When Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh went to the PM to complain about his departmental secretary, Modi advised him to find a balance with bureaucracy and work in tandem with the officials. Is there something amiss?

Ministers of Modi Cabinet, beware! The prime minister is keeping a keen eye on you. Take the incidence that happened a few days ago, where a young and excited Prakash Javadekar, dressed in a fitting pair of jeans and a bright T-shirt, just got off at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi Airport, when his phone rang. Sources reveal that it was Modi on the other line and shot him a direct question, “Are you going to Mumbai on personal work or for party’s work?” “Ji, on party’s work,” is all that Javadekar could muster up the courage to say. “So keep the decorum of clothes in mind,” said Modi. A little later, the same Javadekar was seen at the airport wearing a kurta-payjama. He may have missed his flight but he couldn’t risk missing the “advice” given by the Prime Minister.