Speak on, Speaker

Joshi, for starters, has shaken the Thackeray family tree. He has made the first public assertion by a senior Shiv Sena leader that all is not well between the two men who would succeed Bal Thackeray, his son Uddhav and nephew Raj. He has hinted at the dictatorial ways of Thackeray Senior, who it seems had decided to have his MP, Vikhe-Patil, removed as Union heavy industries minister five whole months before May’s cabinet reshuffle. Not that Joshi is complaining — his party boss’s word, he says, is like a government resolution, it is beyond discussion. Well, from a man who admitted to being remote controlled by Thackeray when he was Maharashtra chief minister, that is no surprise. But if opposition MPs take that as cause for concern — for, a Speaker is supposed to be politically neutral during his tenure — the ruling coalition too may be a little alarmed. Joshi, who was resolutely against disinvestment during his stint in the Vajpayee cabinet, says the opposition is not cornering the treasury benches adequately enough in Parliament. “It is a topic on which they can really bring the government into serious trouble,” he writes. Ahem.

Does this mean Joshi should curb his jottings? Definitely not. Write on, we say. In a book on the Emergency out this week, historian Bipan Chandra complains Indian leaders leave few written explanations of the rationale behind important decisions, making it all the more difficult to flesh out our post-Independence history. For instance, we are still left guessing why Indira Gandhi finally called for elections in 1977 after a year-and-a-half Emergency. If only she had left us a diary. Joshi doesn’t touch on anything nearly as epochal, but may his exertions inspire a thousand diarists.