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Control freak

Just in case there are any doubts, let me clarify: I really like this BJP-led government. After HRD minister Murli Manohar Joshi's posse against the Indira Gandhi National Centre of Art Trust fraud, it's the minister of youth, sports and cultural affairs, Ananth Kumar, who's hunting down the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial Trust aankh-micholi. If all goes as expected, a legislation will be drafted in the winter session of Parliament that will deprive the Shroud of yet another dubiously secured life-presidentship of yet another national Trust, and make the prime minister the JBMT's ex-officio president.

Under the Jallianwala Bagh National Memorial Act, 1951 -- designed to preserve the site in Amritsar and perpetuate the memory of those unarmed Indians who were massacred by General Dyer on April 13, 1919 -- the governor of Punjab, the chief minister of Punjab, the president of the Indian National Congress, and three members nominated by the government, constitute the Trust. Besides the three life trustees, the others are chosen for a five-year term.

On August 7, 1998 -- the day former PM Narasimha Rao's five-year term as JBMT's chairman expired -- only three members of the Trust met at the residence of Sonia Maino Gandhi to elect a new chairperson. These three, viz, Sonia, former prime minister H D Deve Gowda and former HRD minister S R Bommai, coolly appointed themselves as lifetime trustees. After the passing away of Jawaharlal Nehru, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and Saifuddin Kitchlu -- life trustees, all -- the vacancies were not filled up till Sonia, Deve Gowda and Bommai waved their magic wand. Think of the time that elapsed before the vacant posts were filled. And think about the catalyst which is wheeling and dealing within the set-ups of national Trusts...

After Mahatma Gandhi, who was the founder-chairman of the Jallianwala Trust before the Act came into existence, Sonia is the first chairperson who does not hold the office of prime minister. The Italian's appointment violates a convention observed for 79 years. WHAT is so special about her case...? Naturally, only the Jar Jar Jogis will have some sort of answer.

S K Mukherjee, secretary of the Trust who also attended the meeting, had justifications ready for the break in convention; he said it was the prerogative of the trustees to elect the chairperson, and that there is no statutory provision in the Act to appoint the PM ex-officio chairman. He also claimed that all members of the Trust were present at the meeting. Meanwhile, former home minister Indrajit Gupta, also a trustee of the JBMT, is intriguingly quiet on the subject...

In 1919, during the INC session at Amritsar, a resolution was passed to purchase the Jallianwala Bagh massacre land. Gandhiji made an appeal to raise funds, and Rs 900,000 were collected on the spot. However, even after 50 years of Independence, the Jallianwala Bagh stands as a silent witness to the promises made by various Congress governments to provide funds to protect and develop it. When Narasimha Rao visited the site in 1994, he was so shocked at the deplorable condition of the monument that he announced a special grant of Rs 2 crores. Former PM Inder Kumar Gujral visited Amritsar in May 1997 and enhanced that amount to Rs 2.50 crores. The Trust finally received Rs 2 crore in May 1997, but, of course, the work on the development project could not begin...

The Vajpayee government will make the prime minister the ex-officio president of the Trust by amending the Jallianwala Act. Question is, does any government have the right to trifle with what the stalwarts of the Indian National Congress had set up...? That would have been a ponderable issue if it hadn't been for the ubiquitous presence of Janata Dal dorks like Deve Gowda and Bommai as trustees of various old national institutions. What's it about these two that makes them so acceptable to the Shroud? But more significantly, what does the present Kaangres Parti have to do with the INC of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel?? If I remember corr ectly, Gandhiji's Congress agitated against foreigners governing India! It is high time that the rotting relics of that party be laid to rest.

*****

Self-congratulations are in order. I've been revisiting my old essays on the Shroud and I find that since the summer of 1997, every single prediction of mine has turned out to be correct. I remember a columnist, a friend at that time, advising me not to get worked up about her: "Who is she?! Why do you give her so much importance?! She's not worth wasting time over. She doesn't even have ambition." I didn't buy it, of course (later, the same guy began justifying her right to contest). And so it was that I foresaw the Shroud assuming the mantle of the LOP -- and gleefully awaited the results of the new Congress policy of one-woman-all-posts. Well, they've begun to roll in, hahahaha... I take great pleasure in relaying to you the secular angst of Seema Mustafa in The Asian Age; couldn't have said it better meself:

"Leader of the Opposition, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, is totally preoccupied with Bofors, and in defending her family's honour. As a result the Congress party is also preoccupied with Bofors, and in defending their leader's honour. Hence, there is not even a murmur from Delhi about the plight of the cyclone victims with even the rhetoric having been dispensed with these days...

"Mrs Sonia Gandhi, who does not allow even the hint of a conspiracy in the party to go by unchallenged, has not emerged from her high security residence to take the lead in handling this crisis. The Congress as a party is not visible in Orissa, with the party president limiting her role to taking occasional reports from the state chief minister. She could have called in experts to prepare a detailed relief plan and ensured its implementation through teams of volunteers...

"But then ever since the Bofors issue was raised in the form of a CBI chargesheet, Mrs Sonia Gandhi seems to have lost interest in all other matters. Controversial policies of the Vajpayee government are going through unquestioned as the Congress sits at home waiting for directions from its obviously directionless leader. The party will regret having made her the Leader of the Opposition for reasons that will become apparent to even the servile prototype in the days to come."

It's pretty apparent to everybody now -- to even those who find my attacks on the Shroud "tasteless" -- that the woman's "selflessness" was nothing but hogwash. There are specific reasons why various governments were brought down at precise times. And it all has to do with money, power, and the control thereof.

At her first media conference, Sonia had said, "We will pursue the Bofors investigation to its logical and legal conclusion... Have you seen those papers till today? Bring me the proof. If there are any proofs, please bring them by all means so that my husband can be vindicated." And now, the Congress is running helter-skelter simply because the CBI is pursuing the investigation to its logical and legal conclusion...

How desperate can desperate get? If you recall, the Shroud opened her very first speech in Parliament on the subject of the Bofors chargesheet. Thing is, at the inauguration of a new Lok Sabha, the LOP is called upon to speak on the motion of thanks to the President's opening address and is required to dwell on it before touching any other issue. But... such are the wages of panic...

*****

A nugget from G S Bhargava in The Pioneer: "I am sure the high command, which is a synonym for Soniaji in Indian journalese, while introspecting on the poll reverses must also be wondering about it. Incidentally, "high command" was a pejorative allusion to the Congress leadership by the Anglo-Indian Press like The Statesman, The Times of India, The Pioneer and The Civil & Military Gazette in the British days. The implication was that like the Nazi high command, the Congress leaders rode rough shod over the party ranks. But Nehru would frown at the expression. There were instances when he angrily shut up reporters speaking of the high command. He never accepted that there was no internal democracy in the Congress, even if Gandhiji had his way of running it without being a formal member."

Inadvertently, the media has zeroed in on the correct term for the Conggies' deity. Purno Sangma will attest to it.

*****

Without comment: Recently, the Congress demanded an apology from Union law minister Ram Jethmalani for describing Sonia Gandhi as an "illiterate." Mr Jethmalani hasn't responded.

*****

Like it or not, it tickles me to see the Congress's gradual descent into purgatory... Last month, former Union minister K K Tewary asked the CWC to "censure" octogenarian Vithalrao Gadgil for seeking a re-examination of all basic concepts of party ideology, including secularism. "Mr Gadgil must be censured and the CWC must reiterate that all such views were alien to the thinking and philosophy of the present leadership," he quoth.

All that Vithalrao had said in an interview was that Hinduism has an appeal to a large section of the population and that this section was unable to relate to Congress' ideology since they didn't agree with some of its features in the present context. But then, what other reaction could be expected from the likes of Tewary? Minions will be minions to the "leadership."

*****

And speaking of minions, another's head may roll soon: Digvijay Singh is under attack from arch-rival Subhash Yadav, ostensibly for the CM's "anti-farmer policies." But of course, the real reason is quite different: "The chief minister should stop claiming that the party lost in the state due to the alleged Vajpayee wave, and own up responsibility for the defeat. There was no wave. Had there been a wave, the BJP would not have won only 180 seats, and Vajpayeeji's margin of victory would not have come down so drastically." Yadav has tacit support from the "high command."

What's going on is Operation Save-Our-Deity. That is, lay the blame for the poll debacle anywhere except where it belongs. Even though the Shroud won two LS seats, Congresswallahs aren't quite able to credit her with the party's performance in Karnataka, Punjab and Maharashtra. The Shroud pulled crowds, but not the votes. Actually, even her ability to rake in the crowds diminished as the novelty faded. Even so, Sonia asked her stable of MPs to "introspect" and analyse the dismal show of the party. I wonder why anybody else should be doing any introspection at all!

Varsha Bhosle