Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal zealously protects his turf and does not take kindly to anyone, apart from his minister and the PM’s principal secretary, dabbling in what he considers the MEA’s exclusive domain. The FS has sent out advisories to ministers in Vajpayee’s Cabinet not to meet foreign visitors or attend parties thrown by embassies without the express clearance of the MEA. But the MEA can hardly lay down the law to Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani. Much to the chagrin of the Foreign Office, Advani shares a warm relationship with the departing US ambassador Robert Blackwill, who has met the DPM seven times in the last two months.Blackwill has openly expressed his admiration for Advani’s frankness in their exchanges. But Advani’s candour is not appreciated by MEA. Brajesh Mishra, the PM’s principal secretary, might have met Blackwill as frequently as Advani, but the difference is that whenever Mishra meets the ambassador there is invariably a representative from MEA to make a note of what is being said. In the case of Advani, he and Blackwill speak without the presence of a third party so that the MEA has no idea of the conversation.Victim of his image?An Indian Airlines flight from Delhi to Indore carrying delegates to the BJP national executive in Madhya Pradesh’s commercial capital had a large contingent of ministers on board. Despite the presence of many political heavy weights, including the Deputy PM L K Advani, it was Labour Minister Sahib Singh Verma who was singled out for special treatment since Civil Aviation Minister Shahnawaz Hussain had instructed the crew to ensure that there was no repetition of Verma’s much-publicised spat with Jet Air. The airhostesses fussed over Verma, making sure he traveled in comfort. He was first to be served his meal and the first to be presented the complimentary basket of fruit from the airline.At the end of the journey, Hussain expecting a pat on the back, walked up to Verma and asked for form’s sake whether he had any complaints. Instead of appreciation, he found Verma fuming. Someone had offered him a leaking coffee cup and the liquid had spilled onto his spanking white clothes. Verma’s biggest grouse was that he didn’t dare complain about the leaking cup since it would have been misunderstood by all to reinforce his reputation as a perennial fighter cock!Who foots the billA significant government-sponsored Bill which is slated to come before Parliament in this session hopes to change the pattern of political donations and curb black money. Conceived by Law Minister Arun Jaitley, the draft bill allows individuals, HUFs and companies to avail of tax benefits for donations to political parties, as this will discourage under-the-table contributions. A key rider is that loss-making companies would be disallowed from making political contributions. (At present, businessmen find it easy to wangle favours from politicians by being generous at the expense of their shareholders). Even a profit-making company would not be permitted to contribute more than five per cent of its total profits.Crossed visionFrom an Indian perspective, the Defence Minister’s trip to China was significant given George Fernandes’s past hostility towards our powerful neighbour. So anxious was Fernandes to make the journey that he even ignored government’s advice to postpone his visit in view of the prevailing SARS epidemic. Since Fernandes’s large official delegation did not include anyone from the media — not even the ubiquitous ANI cameraman — Doordarshan sent a request to Asia Vision Network’s headquarters in Kuala Lumpur for television footage of the defence minister’s visit. (AVN, a cooperative for sharing of television clips and visuals includes India, China, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Japan as members). Though AVN forwarded the request to China, there was no response from that quarter since the Chinese obviously did not consider Fernandes’s visit important enough to merit coverage!Considering that Doordarshan generously contributes on an average half an hour of TV footage to other members of AVN daily, and gets next to nothing in return it is curious why India continue with the one-sided arrangement. If China let us down on supplying visuals of Fernandes’s visit, earlier Malaysia did not respond to DD’s request for coverage of the Quattrochhi trial.Rao’s ready competitionLeader of the Opposition in the Andhra Pradesh assembly Y S Rajashekhar Reddy’s 15-day padyatra has been drawing crowds. A caravan of five trucks carrying air coolers, tents, chairs, music, posters and buntings for Reddy’s roadside shows precedes him. The success of the padyatra targeting Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu has stirred up intra-party rivalries and former APCC chief Hanumantha Rao is organising a parallel padyatra heading in the opposite direction to Reddy’s march. To highlight the ostentation of Reddy’s cavalcade, Rao plans to travel by bullock cart.Along with colleague Sambhasiva Rao, Hanumantha Rao met Congress President Sonia Gandhi and complained that Reddy’s march was more to project himself than the party, since his posters display only his own mug shot and not those of the Gandhis. To stress his greater loyalty, Rao plans to name his march ‘‘Sonia sandesh yatra.’ The problem is that Congress leaders are not sure of the wisdom of rival yatras emanating from the same party.
