The entire Malyali brigade is working overtime to save India’s Chief Vigilance Officer Thomas. The lobby is headed by PMO’s Kutty Nair, who has convinced Thomas to resign on the condition that once he does, he will get a prominent seat and position. Hate off to the UPA Government, which has started a tradition of rewarding tainted dignitaries.

While Delhi usually feels the chill in December, the political temperature in the capital is only increasing. It’s been 16 days and the Parliament has not functioned. Why doesn’t the government give into the Opposition party’s demand of having a Joint Parliamentary Committee? There lies the moot point. Reliable sources say that the prime minister has made it a prestige issue and is refusing the formation of a JPC. On the other hand, along with Sonia Gandhi, Pranab Mukherjee and other notable members of the party want the JPC to be formed. Actually, Gurudass Gupta from the Communist Party had let it slip in one of the meetings, that if the JPC is formed, they will pull in the PM in it too. The comment has registered with the PM.

The BJP is happy as can be after the Bihar election results, since it won 91 of the 102 seats it contested – a record of sorts. But if the party didn’t have traitors, it would have done better. For instance, from the Araria Vidhan Sabha area, BJP’s contestant Narayan Jha openly told the press that the party’s Parliament member Pradeep Gangai didn’t want him to win the elections and was thus supporting the LJP contestant. It should be remembered that the Parliamentarian wanted his friend and contractor Ajay Jha be given the party ticket. Jha had already lost by a big margin in the by-elections on the party ticket. So when he didn’t get it this time, an inside game started to play out. Now how will the party teach a lesson to such members?

Jaipal Reddy was actively considered for the chief minister’s post in Andhra Pradesh, but it is believed that the name did not get a green signal from 10, Janpath. That’s because her name has also been named in the CWG scams. The important thing, however, is that 90 per cent of the construction tenders were given to contractors from Andhra Pradesh, which means that they had the blessings of Reddy in one way or the other. No wonder 10, Janpath, didn’t like it and took the matter seriously.

When Digvijay Singh arrived in the Central Hall, his favoured journalists surrounded him and all of them had the same issue, “Now you don’t give us interviews at all.” On this Diggy Singh said, “Our party has three core groups – core group, buffer group and duffer group. Since I belong to the duffer group, it is better you practice to talk to those from the core group.” This sudden comment by the minister made the journalists stare at each other in disbelief.

Petroleum Minister Murli Deora is a tad upset with Pranab da nowadays. Deora is trying to find as many ways to raise money for his navratna companies, wants to come out with a big IPO for Indian Oil. He had set the target for the same for October but Pranabda didn’t let it happen. He clearly told Deora that the IPO calendar is full. The government already has so many applications for the sanction of IPOs that Deora’s number can’t come before January. Pranabda’s second argument was that since the IPO size was so big, the environment in the country for such as IPO was nor favourable. Deora will have to wait.

When the BJP was creating a ruckus in the Parliament on a JPC on 2g and Raja, Varun Gandhi couldn’t be spotted anywhere. Far more active than his cousin Rahul, where was he? In New Zealand and came back only last Thursday. As soon as he reached, he got busy with Mission UP. On Sunday, he has a big rally in Mirzapur near Benaras. He reached Benaras by air on Sunday morning and to further strengthen his people’s program, and will proceed to Mirzapur and meet people along the villages. After that, he will spend some time with the family of a Kargil martyr in Badohi Development Block and then speak to the families of Vindhay, Kevat and Mallah families who were afflicted by floods. After paying obeisance to Devi Vindhyavasini Temple, he will address a public gathering in the city club. While Rahul is concentrating on road shows, Varun is paying more attention to the rural vote bank. In short, it is a battle of India and Bharat among the two Gandhis.

Nitin Gadkari’s son is getting married on December 3 in Nagpur. The wedding will be attended by all the biggies of the BJP and NDA’s coalition party heads have also been invited. A few days ago when Gadkari was in Patna, he personally invited Nitish for his son’s wedding and he had readily accepted the invite. As is being expected, Nitish may well have become the chief minister for the second time by then and will get to meet BJP honchos such as Narendra Modi and Varun Gandhi, for whom his dislike is well known. It will be interesting to see how Nitish will react when he sees Narendra and Gandhi. Sushma Swaraj will also attend the wedding. Her problems with Modi have also come out in the open. It will be nice to see how these both will react to each other and cover up their personal emotions under a political garb.

Both “yuva” ministers Pranab Mukherjee and A K Antony didn’t sleep the entire night because of the Maharashtra trouble. After speaking to the house members, they both took a late night flight of 1.10 am, which landed in Delhi at 3.10 am and both reached 10, Janpath, straight from the airport. Sonia Gandhi and Ahmed Patel were already in discussions and waiting for Mukherjee and Antony to come back. Instantly, Prithviraj Chavan was summoned and told to convince Sharad Pawar so that Chavan’s name can be formally announced as the next chief minister and that is exactly what Chavan did.

Former Sangh president Sudarshan’s verbal porings have created quite a stir. Congress’s queen bee’s supporters are in a frenzy and are calling demonstrations and rallies throughout India. The biggies on Congress were oblivious of the interview given by Sudarshan to a newspaper in Madhya Pradesh until the BJP’s Advani Brigade gave wind of the thing. Everyone knows how the both have never gotten along. Before the house started, S S Ahluvalia and Maya Singh were seen to be on an overdrive. If sources are to be believed, both of them moved around the house and told Congress politicians and Parliamentarians about how in a certain newspaper, Sudarshan has made remarks about “madam”. In a hurry, Congress asked for the newspaper from the Parliament library and then got excited about the entire thing. So respected Mr Ironman, “Tere rehte he luta hai chaman bagwa, kaise maan loon kit era ishara na tha”.