If the food was a mix of kabab and samosa over Kashmiri kahva, the flavour was certainly secularism. Avoiding hosting an Iftar party, Ghulam Nabi Azad carefully chose to open his house for an Id-Diwali milan instead. The significance of the festival season was not to be lost. Even Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to J-K tomorrow, Azad said, should be understood in this perspective. Taking a few minutes off his star-studded party — where Bollywood’s Sanjay Khan and wife rubbed shoulders with the UPA top-brass — Azad said, ‘‘I had suggested to the PM that the holy month of Ramzan would be the best time for him to visit Jammu-Kashmir and give a package for the reconstruction of the state.’’ For 14 years years, he said, ‘‘There has been no development, no roads, no schools, no electricity line in J-K. No hospitals have been constructed. Dialogue is a continuous process, it is going on very good track. What the people are looking forward to is reconstruction of the state.both the PM and Congress president Sonia Gandhi are keen to take special initiative in the reconstruction — it is the Track-II on the Kashmir.’’ Though the PM and Home Minister Shivraj Patil stayed for quite a while, the absence of the Congress president, who is away in Rae Bareli, was particularly felt. Bengal’s Pranab Mukherjee and Priyaranjan Dasmunsi were absent while the Maharashtra lobby was present in full force. NCP chief Sharad Pawar was among the first to arrive while CM Vilasrao Deshmukh came after Pawar left. From 10 Janpath circle, Sonia’s political advisor Ahmed Patel dropped in after sundown. Congress oldtimers and ministers — Sheila Dikshit (with a bandaged leg), Oscar Fernandes, P.M. Sayeed, Karan Singh, Prithviraj Chavan, and Delhi contingent were present. So were the Left leaders — Harkishen Singh Surjeet, A.B. Bardhan, D.Raja and Debrata Biswas. Subramanium Swamy — the surprise guest — added a new flavour to the party giving out a twist to the raging Kanchi Shankaracharya-Jayalalithaa tangle. The BJP-NDA was represented by lonesome Madanlal Khurana (who joking said he is pondering over which party to join) and a relaxed Digvijay Singh who didn’t seem overtly occupied by the forthcoming Bihar elections.
