Sunanda Pushkar and Shashi Tharoor

In a sweet gesture towards his wife, Sunanda Pushkar, diplomat-turned- politician Shashi Tharoor happily acknowledged the role she played in nudging him on to complete his latest book, Pax Indica: India and the World of the 21st Century.

Not only did Mr Tharoor who is a Lok Sabha MP representing Thiruvananthapuram reveal that his latest work was dedicated to wife Sunanda, but also thanked her during the launch of the book. In a lighter vein, the MP also remarked, “I’m not sure that she’ll be content playing the role of muse. But she’s certainly played the role of tyrant in absolutely insisting that I get on with it because this is a book that is occupying me for a couple of years.” So the “tyrant” who wanted the book complete by her birthday in late June succeeded in cajoling her husband to do just that as acknowledged by Mr Tharoor. He remarked that this demand “concentrated my mind wonderfully”.
For good measure he added, “Thanks to her encouragement as well as her understanding of my frequent bleary eyed absences on the computer, this book has finally seen the light of day.” Now need we repeat the adage “Behind every successful man is a woman.” Mr Tharoor would surely agree.

The new trouble shooter
The fact that Prime Minister holds Kapil Sibal in high esteem and values his judgment is fairly well-known in political and bureaucratic circles. It is now believed that Mr Sibal also played a key role in removing hurdles for evolving consensus on Pranab Mukherjee’s name as UPA Presidential nominee. Now that Pranab da is all set to move to Raisina Hills, Congress would largely feel his absence as dada is known to be the main trouble shooter for the Congres both within and outside the Parliament.
Since the crucial Monsoon Session of Parliament is scheduled to start next month, Congress circles are now abuzz that Mr Sibal will be given additional responsibility of floor co-ordination and management in both Houses and dealing with a hostile opposition. Something which Pranab da had been doing for several years.

A chance not to be lost
Temperamental West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee took pains to give an exhaustive explanation for her decision to support the Presidential nominee Pranab Mukherjee. However, a favourable decision for the UPA nominee for the highest Constitutional post from Banerjee was quite in the offing. This was for the fact that she put up on her Facebook a letter written by Mukherjee to her on July 15, which, was, however, dated July 2. Furthermore, the letter was the same which Mukherjee had sent to all the MPs and MLAs on July 2. So, the speculation began doing rounds that Banerjee may announce her support to the UPA nominee and the indication was the Facebook posting.
Sources within the Trinamool Congress stated that the party would have been in a tough position if it did not take in electing the first Bengali President. As a Bengali scribe puts it that people in West Bengal nurse grievances that justice was not done to Subhash Chandra Bose and Jyoti Bose, hence the opportunity should not be lost in the case of Pranab Mukherjee.

An office bearer with shared charge
Presence and absence of important political leaders on certain occasions provide a lot of food for thought for the new age byte gathering journalism, as this led to a serious speculation over AICC general secretary Digvijay Singh’s fate in the party and talks had started doing the rounds whether he was being “stripped’ of the charge of Uttar Pradesh and Assam. As the “comedy of error” was being enacted on TV channels last week, speaking of a virtual sack of Singh from the AICC Secretariat, AICC media managers had a tough time dismissing them as “baseless” reports. The speculation actually began with another Congress general secretary B.K. Hariprasad accompanying the MPs from UP and Assam went to meet party chief Sonia Gandhi.
The confusion was worse confounded, as party spokesman Manish Tewari said, “Sometimes an office bearer is given a particular responsibility and sometimes part of his responsibility is given to somebody else also.”
This prompted reporters to rush to Mr Hariprasad, who denied the rumours. Later, AICC general secretary Janardan Dwivedi ended the speculation and said that Mr Singh was busy with some work.