Double-faced Congress
Though Delhi and Dehradun are not far off in terms of physical distance there is a yawning distance between the two as far as the Congress’ varied stances on the tea plantation are concerned. While All India Congress Committee (AICC) vice- president Rahul Gandhi has said in a twitter that he would turn up at Jantar Mantar in Delhi to throw his full weight behind the tea estate workers from West Bengal who have been staging a sit-in at the eminent protest site in the national capital, venting grievances against the plantation’s proposed takeover Chief Minister of Uttarakhand seems hell- bent on annihilating a 150-year-old tea estate in Dehradun to house smart city. Despite the shrill voice of opposition against the impending takeover reaching crescendo, the state government has signed MoU with a Chinese company on the matter. Even they have managed to have HUDCO agree to finance the smart city project. Now, the question that begs answer is why Congress would show double face regarding an emotive matter. However, the observers say that there is nothing new in it, as the grand old party of India has turned adept in the game of running with the hare and hunting with the hound.
Importance of cane
A senior bureaucrat, who used to flaunt a bamboo stick kept in one corner of his office seems to have morphed into a new avatar with the stick vanishing following his recent important promotion. Justifying the presence of the cane, he used to say that it would prove its efficacy once the weapon of persuasiveness failed to bludgeon the lazy subordinates into submission. The other babus are a tad curious now, finding the cane nowhere. They are relieved too, as they apprehended that following the promotion, the highly-placed Babu would bare fangs, nay cane, to make them to kowtow. They say that the formerly cane-wielding Babu is trying hard to hide his inherent fire under the garb of hard-won composure. One of them likens his present state to lord Shiva, absorbing the global poison, in the form of Nilkantha. But they wonder when Nilkantha would again turn Rudra to burn them all into ashes by the fire of his wrath. Another opines that the senior Babu has got chastened in course of his multitudinous experiences gained through numerous stints in bureaucracy. They are all waiting with their fingers crossed while the senior Babu is struggling hard to transcend himself to turn into an all-absorbing overlord having power, yet sans the desire to use it to make others to genuflect through the fear of cane lashes.
Sachivalaya or Shauchalaya
Secretariat being a place where you can meet all the important babus from chief secretary down to under secretary, officials are fed up with the plethora of meetings going on marathon-like these days. One of the secretaries quipped in disgust that now the sachivalaya is being reduced to shauchalaya as the rubbish they are gathering through meetings are being thrown out in the meetings that follow. These days chief minister, chief secretary, principal secretary, chief principal secretary, secretaries and additional secretaries are all engaged in convening meetings separately. later, to disseminate the messages that the meetings throw up they convene another meeting with the subordinates. The subordinates on their part convene meeting with those lying in the lower rung and the meeting spree continues ad infinitum.