Fly on the wall - PM’s olive branch to Azad

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

PM’s olive branch to Azad

Whether it was an emotional gesture or deep politics, no one can vouchsafe. But it was the rarest of the rare moment in Rajya Sabha on Tuesday last when PM Modi told Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Aazad, “Do not feel like you are no longer in the House. I would not let you retire, I will continue taking your advice. My doors are always open for you.” Azad is bidding adieu to his 41 year long parliamentary career. It transpires that the Gandhis were upset with him for something and hence he was not re-nominated to the Rajya Sabha and left high & dry. It is in this backdrop that Modi made this offer stunning everybody. Modi has never made such an offer in public to any Opposition leader. On his part, Ghulam Nabi Azad made no secret of his chemistry with Modi saying, “Two people always greeted me during festivals and my birthday for many years - Congress president Sonia Gandhi and PM Modi." Aren’t bells ringing!!! The BJP doesn’t have a tall Muslim leader and those in its kitty are hardly of any stature. Ghulam Nabi may be of use for Modi’s international brotherhood outreach having huge experience behind him.

Pawar & Cong disconnected!

There is a long history of love-hate relationship between the Congress and NCP since 1999. They buried the hatchet to form the MVA government. But all is not well these days and gone are the days of Sharad Pawar-Rahul Gandhi bon-homie. Pawar is unhappy because the Congress torpedoed his plans to make him UPA co-chairman and now he is on his own trip. He is stitching alliances with TMC, SP, YSR-Congress, TRS, BJD, Shiv Sena, Akali Dal and others. Rahul is content with the DMK, Left, IUML etc. Even the RJD is cool towards Rahul Gandhi these days. The Congress was left in the lurch when the delegation of 10 Opposition parties went to meet farmers on Delhi borders consisting of Supriya Sule and others. The appointment of Nana Patole as Maharashtra PCC Chief turned out to be the last straw in Camel’s back. Pawar’s reluctance to give the Speaker's post to Congress is part of NCP’s plan, say insiders. Is something cooking??? Watch out!!

Cooking Golden goose

When the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) scheme was launched by Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru in November 1951, had not imagined that it would become a tool in the hands of the rich to cook golden goose. It was to help employees in the public and private sector with employers contributing their 12% share in their accounts. There was no limit for employees to deposit money in their accounts. The interest income is tax-free without limit. For 70 years, the rich employees raked in mullahs. But they did not realize that PM Modi has the uncanny knack of tracking those making a killing. Interestingly, top bureaucrats who are big beneficiaries of this scheme never pointed it out to successive Finance Ministers about rich employees making a killing. The PM sought a detailed report and was shocked to learn that the largest single deposit in the account of one employee in EPF was over Rs 100 crores. It was also noticed that such employees earned tax-free interest income of more than Rs 50-60 lakhs year after year. The number of such huge beneficiaries is 1.20 lakhs employees and they put a staggering Rs 62,500 crores in their EPF accounts. There are 5 crores EPF account holders. The EPF has a corpus of Rs. Seven lakh crores as on February 1, 2021. The scheme was for employees earning Rs 15000 or more a month. The Union Budget has capped interest free income at Rs 2.50 lakhs per year now, down from Rs 50 lakhs earlier. Another loot and scoot stopped!

Biden, So near & so far

When US President Joe Biden nominated 20 Indian-Americans to key positions in his administration, it was hailed as a big win for India and Modi's leadership. But analysts pointed out that Biden excluded those who are considered close to the RSS-BJP like Sonal Shah and Amit Jani. Sonal Shah’s father was the president of Overseas Friends of BJP-USA and is the founder of RSS-run Ekal Vidyalaya. The suspicions of Biden’s not-so-friendly attitude came correct when many close to the Biden administration lent their support to agitating farmers in India including the niece of Vice President Kamala Harris. External Affairs Minister Jaishankar has a tough task in hand.

Opposition got lion's share of Committees in RS

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Opposition got lion's share of Committees in RS

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Sep 14

The Opposition members in Rajya Sabha have been given the lion's share this year when it comes to giving them chairmanship of joint parliamentary standing committees.

Compared to the previous two years, the Opposition benches were given five standing committees of the Upper House instead of four. Rajya Sabha Chairman M.Venkaiah Naidu approved the appointment of chairpersons of the eight Committees under which the ruling BJP gets headship of three Committees. He also approved nomination of Rajya Sabha on the 16 DRSCs of Lok Sabha. Constitution and chairpersons of the 16 DRSCs serviced by the Lok Sabha were also approved by Speaker Om Birla.

Of the DRSCs of Rajya Sabha, Anand Sharma and Jairam Ramesh (Congress) obtained two committees,

of Congress will head the DRSC on Home Affairs while his party colleague Shri Jairam Ramesh will chair the Committee on Science, Technology, Environment & Forests.

Prof.Ramgopal Yadav (SP) was appointed chairman of Health & Family Welfare committee while Dr. K. Keshava Rao (TRS) is Chairperson of Industry Committee. V.Vijay Sai Reddy (YSRCP) is heading Commerce.

Satyanarayan Jatiya, Bhupendra Yadav and T.G.Venkatesh from BJP are heading three committees.

Main opposition Congress retained it’s quota of chairmanship of two committees.

Venkaiah Naidu held consultations with Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs Shri Prahlad Joshi before finalising the composition of the committees.

16 Committees fall under the Lok Sabha and in all there are 24 Department Related Standing Committees of both houses.

Big Win for Amit Shah in Lok Sabha

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Big Win for Amit Shah in Lok Sabha

BSP, BJP, YSR Congress, TRS, TDP supported

NCP, TMC, JD (U) walked out

J&K, Ladakh now Uts after Parliament's nod

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, Aug. 6

The BJP achieved another feather in its cap in Lok Sabha when it obtained the support of 85% of MPs on the historic bills relating to Jammu & Kashmir.

As many as 370 MPs out of 440 MPs present in the House voted for the bills surpassing the strength of the NDA despite the fact that 16-member strong JD (U) walked out of the House.

The strength of the Lok Sabha is 542. But only 440 were present today for the voting with 102 absent.

But parties after parties lent their support to the J&K Bills including YSR Congress (22) after its leader Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy met the PM at 5 pm. The Bahujan Samaj Party (10), Biju Janata Dal (12), TDP (3), TRS (9), JD-S (1), AAP (1) and Independents (4) overwhelmingly supported the Bill. Navneet Rana, Maharashtra's Independent MP made forceful speech supporting the bill despite being elected with the support of the NCP. Its a different matter that NCP walked out after Supriya Sule made a speech which supported the bill and opposed it too. The party found it difficult to support the bill after walking out in the Rajya Sabha.

If the BJP obtained two-third majority in Rajya Sabha despite having only 78 MPs only, it mustered the support of 401 MPs out of 542 MPs in the Lok Sabha. This was a feather in the cap of the BJP leadership which virtually forced the hands of the non-NDA parties to lent support.

Barring the Congress, DMK, SP and the Left and a couple of Muslim parties, none was against the dilution of Article 370, abolishion of Article 35A and bifurcation of the State of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh and making them union territories.

The TMC (22) also decided to stay away from voting.

Interestingly, senior Congress leader Jyotiraditya Scindia tweeted in support of the Bills causing huge anxiety amongst the party leaders about his future course of action.

Prime Minister Modi had set the 100-Day deadline before every Cabinet Minister to implement the BJP's manifesto. The J&K Bill is perhaps the last of major tasks except for the construction of the Ram Temple which is before the Supreme Court where day-to-day hearing has begun.

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Fly on the Wall :Ajit Singh, Raju targeted in Air Asia case

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Ajit Singh, Raju targeted in Air Asia case

The timing of CBI's action against Air Asia (India) Limited (AAIL), a joint venture between the prestigious Tata Sons Limited and others

surprised many in the corridors of powers. The fact that Air Asia case was hanging fire for a long time and no one was interested in pursuing it either considering the fact that TATAs were partners in the project and it also involved Tony Fernandes, a Malaysian businessman of India origin. But changed political situation brought sudden alacrity at the CBI headquarters and everybody was under fire irrespective of the status. It now transpires that two former Civil Aviation Ministers, Ajit Singh and Ashok Gajapati Raju, are also under the scanner in the case apart from some officials of the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) who also cleared the proposal. The CBI say that Air Asia was granted critical permissions to fly on international routes in violation of laid down rules and procedures which were arbitrarily amended by the then ministers and officials. Incidentally, Praful Patel was not the Civil Aviation Minister and had made way for Ajit Singh of RLD who headed the ministry from December 18, 2011 to May 25, 2014. The Air Asia submitted applications to the FIPB in February 2013 and received a formal approval in April 2013, followed by the no objection certificate in September 2013 and an Air Operating Permit in May 2014 permitting it to start domestic operations in India. Simultaneously, a secret cabinet note was sent on 27 February 2014 to the cabinet to amend the existing 5/20 rule for operation of international scheduled in civil aviation. Tony Fernandes, wanted the airline to fly on international routes and local partner Tata Sons through its nominee Venkataramanan, was supposed to lobby to obtain government approvals including a FIPB clearance and an amendment to then prevalent 5/20 civil aviation rule. The 5/20 rule stipulated that international flying licenses could be granted to airlines with five years' of domestic operations and a minimum of 20 aircraft in their fleet. The civil aviation ministry had sent a clarification in the form of a supplementary note on 5 March 2014 to the cabinet to relax the rules. But it could not be done as Lok Sabha polls had been announced on 5 March 2014. Finally, the 5/20 rule was relaxed in June 2016 when Ashok Gajapati Raju of the TDP was the Civil Aviation Minister. The Air Asia probe was hanging fire as the government didn't want to needle either Ajit Singh of the RLD or Raju who was NDA partner until a couple of months ago. Now that Ajit Singh has aligned with SP-BSP-Congress and TDP parted company with the NDA, there was no reason for the government to put the probe on the back burner.

TRS plans to open Federal front office

The Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao seem to be in a big hurry. If reports are true, he is set to open Federal Front office in Delhi in June-July. He is so desperate to cement the front of non-BJP and non-Congress parties, that he has decided to open an office in Delhi at his official residence at 23, Tuglak Road itself. The sprawling bungalow in Lutyens’ Delhi has been allotted to the CM and his daughter, K. Kavitha, a member of the Lok Sabha. KCR decided to open the office to give a fillip to like-minded parties after he held back to back meetings with several leaders including M. Karunanidhi, M.K. Stalin, former UP CM Akhilesh Yadav, Mamata Banerjee, former Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, H D Deve Gowda and others. KCR would be visiting Bhubaneswar later this month to meet Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik and also visit Mumbai to meet Shiv Sena leader Uddhav Thackeray and NCP leader Sharad Pawar. TRS MPs in Delhi are trying to get an appointment with BSP leader Mayawati. But she is somewhat cool to the idea of a federal front itself. KCR is planning to hold a round-table conference with different parties and experts at the time of the office inauguration in New Delhi.

Rahul changes tack, hugs Jagan Reddy now !

Gone are the days when Rahul Gandhi was stubborn, inflexible and a poor listener. Over the past couple of months, Congressmen and callers on him are feeling a sea-change in the attitude and conduct of the new Congress president. Now all this a thing of the past and he is responding to calls, available to party leaders and even shunning his notions against some of the leaders. He principle is to stop Prime Minister Narendra Modi at all costs from returning to power during 2019 Lok Sabha polls. In order to achieve this objective, he is willing to walk an extra mile which he did in Karnataka to the surprise of the BJP leadership. He even installed Kamal Nath as president of the Madhya Pradesh unit of the party despite personal dislike. Recently, he has given the go-ahead to explore all possibilities to tie up with YSR Congress leader Jagan Mohan Reddy. The Congress party was virtually a pocket borough edition of YSR Reddy in Andhra Pradesh. However, the Congress leadership refused to accept Jagan Mohan Reddy as the automatic choice for the Chief Ministership. This finally led to the extinction of the Congress itself from the state. Now Rahul Gandhi has signaled that Congress is willing to do business with YSR Congress. As part of this strategy, Digvijay Singh has been divested of the charge of Andhra Pradesh and former Kerala CM Omen Chandy has been appointed general secretary incharge. Chandy was very close to YS Chandrshekhar Reddy. Rahul Gandhi is pursuing the same strategy in every state with the sole objective to dislodge the BJP and concede even the prime position held by the party.

BJP Presidential nominee by June 21

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Special Report 

Presidential candidate

BJP presidential nominee by June 21

Amit Shah meets Naidu & others

3-member ministerial panel working in full swing

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, June 13

The three member ministerial group to hold consultations with the allies and the Opposition parties for the selection of the Presidential candidate held its first meeting this morning.

The meeting was held at the residence of  Urban Development and I&B Minister M Venkiah Nadu, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Home Minister Rajnath Singh. Interestingly, the BJP president Amit Shah was also present at the meeting.

It is learnt that the name of the BJP’s presidential candidate will be finalized early next week and all consultation process with allies and Opposition parties will be completed by then. An elaborate plan was discussed today to finalise the roadmap, from selection to filing nomination papers, for the party’s Presidential candidate before June 21-22. 

It was somewhat an irony that Venkiah Naidu who was in the reckoning for the President’s post, has been made a member of the selection committee itself.

According to informed sources, the top leaders met to evolve a strategy as who will speak to which party and which groups. While Arun Jaitley will talk to leaders of Opposition parties in the Rajya Sabha since he has a very high level of personal relationship with them. He has a great rapport with Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Derek Obrian of TMC, Ram Gopal Yadav (Samajwadi Party), Satish Mishra (BSP), Praful Patel (NCP) and others. He has high level of comfortable relations with Anand Sharma (Congress) and deputy chairman P J Kurien. Amongst the allies, he is close to the Akali Dal leadership and a large number of Independents and smaller parties.

Venkiah Naidu has primarily been charge of talking to all political parties of southern India including Pudducherry and Chief Ministers of various states. The TDP, TRS, various factions of the AIADMK, Janata Dal (S), Rajnath Singh will handle Jammu & Kashmir and North Eastern State Parties and chief ministers.

The task is not only to focus on the Members of Parliament of Lok Sabha & Rajya Sabha but also MLAs who will count in a big way. There is a whole battery of smaller parties in states and Independents.

The objective is to talk to all these MPs, MLAs and parties to obtain their in-principle support for the BJP nominee and thereafter talk to the Opposition parties.

As per plan, the ruling NDA will complete the process this week end and thereafter the process of consultations with the Opposition will begin.

The last date for filing nominations is June 28.

Meanwhile, the government constituted  a committee of secretaries headed by Cabinet Secretary P K Sinha to oversee arrangements for the swearing-in-ceremony of the new president on July 25.

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AIADMK to support BJP’s presidential candidate

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

A Lokmat Exclusive report

AIADMK to support BJP’s presidential candidate

Modi gets shot in the arm;  Dy Speaker Thambidurai key negotiator

Harish Gupta

New Delhi, April 24

The BJP is set to get a shot in its arm as the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu has signaled its support to NDA’s presidential nominee.

Irrespective of infighting within the two AIADMK camps and current negotiations to resolve the crisis, the ruling dispensation has communicated to the BJP that it will support its candidate in the Presidential polls to be held in July this year.

  

The AIADMK’s signal of support has given the BJP big comfort as the ruling NDA is still short of 25000 popular votes to get its own candidate elected. Though Opposition parties are fragmented and still working out modalities to come together to filed a common candidate. But they have to get the support of several regional ruling parties in states including AIADMK, TRS, BJD, TMC etc. Amongst these non-BJP parties, the AIADM is crucial as it has 135 MLAs and 50 MPs in parliament constituting almost 60,000 popular votes. The electorate for presidential polls comprises of 11 lakh plus votes and the NDA has 5.25 lakh votes. Therefore, the complete support for the NDA will give a big boost to the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.

  

It transpires that Deputy Speaker of the Lok Sabha M Thambidurai had a meeting with the Prime Minister and the BJP Amit Shah as well. Unconfirmed report suggested that he conveyed to the BJP leaders that the ruling AIADMK KPS camp having the support of 123 MLAs and 50 MPs in Lok Sabha & Rajya Sabha will support the NDA’s presidential candidate. The AIADMK (OPS) having 12 MLAs is already backing the BJP. The AIADMK is rather keen to formally join the NDA, these sources say. After the death of Jayalalitha, there is no leader worth a salt in the AIADMK who has national ambitions. The OPS camp is already close to the Centre and the ruling KPS camp wants a patch up to get the two leaves symbol de-frozen.

However, the BJP leadership is in no hurry to admit the AIADMK despite pressure from M Thambidurai. The AIADMK MPs have virtually no role despite having the biggest contingent in parliament. The AIADMK leaders are keen to join the Modi government and share power. It is learnt that formal announcement by the AIADMK will be made sometime next month once formula is worked out.