Fly on The Wall : Bitter battle grips Railway Board

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

A bitter battle has gripped the Rail Bhawan here ever since Ashwini Lohani was appointed chairman of the Railway Board in a mid-night coup. Lohani was brought by the PMO after A K Mittal quit in the wake of two consecutive railway accidents last month. While the Railway administration was still in the process of absorbing the shocking news of Mittal quitting, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu also quit. But all hell broke when Lohani was brought to the Railway Board as its chairman. Lohani could not have been appointed as Chairman under the rules and procedures. Insiders say that rules were thrown to the winds. Rules state that unless an officer held the post of General Manager in the Railways, he cannot become a Member of the board or its chairman. A non-member can become chairman of the board. But the condition is that he must have an experience of working as GM in the Railways. Lohani was two ladder down in the seniority and yet he was made chairman straight. The insult to the injury was also in store as Lohani also superseded two highly competent and senior members of the Railway Board. The two members are Ravindra Gupta and Mohammad Jamshed who are bitter and contemplating quitting. The position of these two members has become untenable with Lohani's appointment. The new Railway Minister, Piyush Goyal is busy sorting out the grave issue as both of them reportedly threatened to quit. Goyal wants to resolve this anomaly as continued acrimony can take a turn for the worse. The internal trouble has cropped up at a time when the Railways is trying to overcome serious problems. No doubt, Lohani is an old Railway hand and a technical guy himself. He is reported to have impressed the PMO when he was made ITDC chairman. His appointment had raised eyebrows in the ITDC as well. But within no time, he got a big boost and brought as Chairman Air India.

Amit Shah's advice to Narain Rane

The BJP high command has conveyed to dissident Congress leader Narain Rane to keep patience and his entry is only a matter of time. BJP president Amit Shah had a meeting with him a couple of months ago where in principle decision was taken to admit the Ranes into the BJP. Amit Shah's philosophy is to admit leaders from other parties with an open arm and once they are in the BJP, they would be “reformed.” Shah is of the firm view that this is the only way to expand BJP in a short span and win Lok Sabha seats. This open arm policy is contrary to most of his predecessors who were rather slow in admitting leaders from other parties. But Amit Shah wants every influential leader to be part of the BJP. Therefore, he has conveyed to Rane that he would surely be admitted.

India Foundation calls the shots

What is common among Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu, Minister of State for Civil Aviation Jayant Sinha and MoS External Affairs M J Akbar ? All of them are professionals and highly successful and their rise has been rather brisk. In the case of Nirmala Sitharaman, it has been phenomenal. But there is one more factor; all of them are key member of the India Foundation, a think tank founded by BJP general Secretary Ram Madhav. His focus is to ensure that BJP gets more Lok sabha seats in states where it didn't get numbers in 2014. The Think-Tank formally came into being early 2014 though Ram Madhav was working for Narendra Modi in Gujrat for a long time. Ram Madhav is considered a parallel power centre. There are as many as eight such think tanks floated by those associated with the RSS & BJP. But India Foundation and Vivekanand International Foundation are the two most powerful think tanks providing talented persons to the Modi government. Interestingly, Ram Madhav keeps a low profile and works from behind the scenes. The rise of Nirmala Sitharaman is being attributed to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley. But it is said that Ram Madhav is the key behind her success and worked hard to promote her at every stage. He prefers to handle security and international affairs apart from J&K and North eastern states.

The mystery of 'Old Notes' deepens as RBI counts

The mystery of “old notes” demonetized and deposited with banks deepened further after the RBI said: Rs 15.28 lakh crores in old notes out of Rs 15.44 lakh crores had been counted and final figure will be released later. This leaves only Rs 16000 crores which were not deposited with the RBI. But think of 'Old Notes' still lying with Nepal Rashtriya Bank and other neighbouring countries. The figure is stated to be over Rs 8000 crores. The RBI has yet to accept around Rs 7000 crores from Cooperative banks. Then, thousands and thousands of NRIs who made a bee-line outside the RBI branches failed to deposit old notes who came from all over the world as government changed rules at will. In addition, banned notes lying with the Income Tax, ED, Police in states and other agencies could not be deposited with the RBI either. Did India print more notes than notified ? No one has a clue. But everyone in the government is frightened if the old notes in the “pipeline” are allowed to be deposited.

Mamata wants Kejri in Mahagathbandhan

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is pitching for the inclusion of Aam Aadmi Party into the grand alliance of 17 Opposition parties. Mamata wants Arvind Kejriwal to be part of the “Mahagathbandhan” as he is a force in Delhi and elsewhere. However, the Congress has puts its foot down and made it clear that there is no place for AAP in the front. Rather, the Congress leadership has cautioned Mamata Banerjee to keep away as Kejriwal is known for selling dreams. The Congress leaders sheepishly confessed how Kejriwal fooled Shiela Dixit saying that he will never float a political party and work for her victory in Delhi. But Mamata is unwilling to dump Kejriwal. Perhaps, Kejriwal has promised to campaign for Mamata and project her as Prime Ministerial candidate in 2019.

We are providing free medicines and tests to all: Nadda

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

'We are providing free medicines, tests to all'

We are providing free medicines and tests to all: Nadda

Union Minister for health and family welfare Jagat Prakash Nadda says free check-up will be done in case of those above 30 years of age and suffering from hypertension, diabetes, oral cancer and breast cancer. We are going to roll out this scheme in 100 districts this year.

Medicines too will be given free of cost. Similarly, we have decided to open 20 state-of-the-art cancer units. Under the Prime Minister's Dialysis Scheme, the government will open dialysis centres in about 400 districts across the country.

HARISH GUPTA

Questions: Is “free medicine and free treatment to all' your new slogan?

Answer : Free drugs and diagnostics will be available to all whether they take treatment in a private hospital or a government hospital. Our government has rolled out free drugs and diagnostic facilities. This is a revolutionary step in the field of healthcare. The government is offering 500 medicines free of cost. Now the states have to implement this. Many state have already come forward to implement this. Moreover, there are many other schemes too.

Q. What are the new schemes?

A : There will be free check-up for those above 30 years of age and who are suffering from hypertension, diabetes, oral cancer, breast cancer etc. This will be done in the entire country. We are going to roll out this plan this year in 100 districts. We have decided to open 20 state-of-the-art cancer units. They will be built at a cost of Rs.150 crore. The project will also inculde 50 cancer centres which too will be opened. Under the Prime Minister's Dialysis Scheme, the government will open dialysis centres in about 400 districts across the country. One per cent rise would be registered in the Universal Immunization (vaccination) programme for new born babies every year. We have taken it up to eight per cent in the last two years and proposed to take it up to 10 per cent. This has been a great achievement. There were seven types of vaccines in the immunization programme so far, which we have increased to 11 now. Our government has done a landmark work in a short span of time.

Q. But in Delhi, the Kejriwal government too is offering free medicines and tests?

A: All the money to the district hospitals comes from the centre. in Delhi also, whatever free drugs and diagnostic tests are being offered in the district hospitals, are being funded by the centre only.

Q. So the Kejriwal government is just bragging while you are doing the real work?

A. All I would say is that the government of India is working. There are many state governments that are taking advantage of Centre's schemes.

Q. You fixed the prices of stent and keen treatment. It took you three years to do. When will you fix the cost of other surgeries?

A. We are working on it. Our effort is to cap costs of all essential surgeries.

Q. It seems you are afraid of the hospital lobby?

A: Not at all. We do 'solid' work. We do not get affected by the lobby.

Q. You generic medicines policy has stirred the hornet's nest among drug companies. But this order sounds more populist. Nothing is happening on the ground!

A. Whenever any changes occur, they have their own reactions. For, the decisions are taken for the benefit of the people. Just wait... the work is going on.

Q. But the effect of medical lobby is quite conspicuous in case of medical colleges!

A. We are bringing the National Medical Commission Bill. There will be uniform policy in the entire Country.

Q. You had assured about this Bill when you became a minister?

A. This Bill is in the final stage. After all, whenever there is a problem, it is necessary to make fool-proof arrangement.

Q. You superseded the MCI. Then there was some problem in the Supreme Court appointed committee? Then you formed the 'oversight committee'?

A. I will not make any comment on this. We are trying to establishing a transparent system. Look at NEET. It is a glaring example of our transparency. The National Medical Commission will be formed too. We will do away with the these problems.

Q. You are opening AIIMS in every states. But there are neither doctors nor trained staff?

A. We have increased 20,000 seats in PG and UGC courses. After all, it takes time to set up AIIMS-like institutions on such a large scale. We can not compromise on institutions like AIIMS.

Q. But you are cutting down the healthcare budget?

A. No, we are raising the budget. There is a 27 per cent increase this year. But the states have not been able to spend the money. When I assumed charges, they were spending about 20 per cent only. After a lot of hard work, it has now gone up to 40 per cent.

Q. The government is silent on this issue of 'population'?

A. We are working on family development mission. Today, the total fertility rate in 24 states has come down to 2.1 per cent. It is more than 3 per cent in 8 states. In these states, 140 districts are such where we are doing micro-planning for each one of them.

Q. But there is no discussion whatsoever, about it. Are you doing it quietly?

A. You have to concentrate only on your work while doing some good work. This is very serious task and the results will be for all to see.

Q. You once proposed to regulate the sale and consumption of tabacoo, but went silent after that?

A. prevention is very essential. We are laying emphasis on public education and awareness, which has been 6 per cent reduction in consumption of tabacco in the last three years. The effects can be seen even in cinema halls. If regulation will be required even after that, we will do that too.

Q. In Gujarat and Karnataka, the BJP has announced its leaders. But why is it not doing so in Himachal?

A. The BJP prepares separate plans for every state. In many states, we contested elections after announcing names of the leaders. But in many states, we did not do so. It is the BJP Parliamentary Board which takes a decision in this regards.

Q. Some people say that you are BJP's 'secret card'?

A. There is absolutely no truth in it. The BJP Parliamentary Board takes the decision on all such matters and it will take a right decision at the right time.

Sharad Yadav interview

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Rahul Gandhi is a good, clean person

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Didi may challenge Modi in 2019

by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group

Since Narendra Modi bulldozed the parliament in May 2014, and repeated the feat three years later in Uttar Pradesh, the largest state, the opposition is overwrought with frustration. With the chances of its electoral recovery rather distant, it is unable to paper over the lengthening, and deepening, lines of its internal fissures. Like Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar’s exit from its camp; his JD(U) facing an existential crisis; or the CPI(M), which is convulsing with internal dissensions so deep that its general secretary Sitaram Yechury fails to get his party’s nod for returning to the Rajya Sabha with Congress support.

The opposition is hamstrung for other reasons too. Faced with BJP, RSS and their ideological challenge, the traditional ‘secular’ politician seems to have lost the plot. His response to incidents of serious cultural onslaught is feeble, at best. For example, no opposition party has worked out a coherent strategy to combat the Hindutva groups nursing their private militia in the name of cow vigilantes. They attack cow vigilantism as though it were the handiwork of extreme bigots sheltered by the Hindutva groups. But they have failed to present it as an integral part of an agenda to turn the religious minorities into second class citizens. Their bankruptcy surfaced when Congress workers attacked a BJP leader in Chhattisgarh responsible for cows death. On the rare occasions that Congress president Sonia Gandhi, or Rahul Gandhi, the vice president, comment on contemporary issues, they fail to strike a chord. While Rahul shoots and scoots, his mother has limited grasp of India’s social and civilizational issues. BSP supremo Mayawati, always shy to venture beyond Dalit issues has become even more tongue-tied. Down south in Tamil Nadu, ruling AIADMK and two other factions are getting sucked into the BJP rather than trying to redefine themselves in India’s political landscape after the end of multi-party rule. In Maharashtra, so total is the hold of BJP that Shiv Sena, its ideological sibling and local rival for power, outshines other opposition parties. In the states where the Congress is ensconced, such as Karnataka, there is not much certainty about its continuance.

In such bleak scenario for the opposition, two things are missing—leadership and strategy. Some of the opposition parties assumed that, in fighting BJP, the best strategy would be to forget past differences with the Congress and tie up with it. In Uttar Pradesh, former chief minister Akhilesh Yadav tried it, and paid heavily for that mistake. In West Bengal, the CPI(M), by fighting the 2016 assembly election jointly with the Congress, fell into the same trap.

With the passing of years, if there is a single opposition leader to cobble up a strategy against BJP’s divisive politics, she is Mamata Banerjee. The West Bengal chief minister is a master player of the caste and sub-caste cards. In 2011, she succeeded in putting the 34-year-old CPI(M) rule to an end my mobilising the subalterns against a party which, though highly regimented, had only higher castes in its upper echelons.

Her Bengal is in BJP’s crosshairs for a long time. During CPI(M) rule, there was no entry for the Hindutva politics as the state’s poor were entirely identified with the hammer-and-sickle. BJP thought that, following the Marxists’ exit, it may be able to polarize votes.

But the BJP’s strategy against Mamata Banerjee has not succeeded so far. It brought limited dividend in 2014 with BJP getting 16 per cent votes (only two seats). But the BJP share came down to 10 per cent in the assembly elections two years later. Banerjee ruled the roost as her deft ‘salami slicing’ of the state’s huge OBC and dalit population did not allow the BJP to herd all non-Hindus under the saffron shamiana. It is a strategy that has worked.

In India, with ‘forward caste’ population estimated to be around 25 per cent (that leaves three-quarters of the population comprising the entire panoply of OBC and dalit, plus minorities), it is tough for BJP, to win elections without support from a large section of non-caste Hindus. That explains why Modi, and party president Amit Shah, have been reaching out to those on the lower rungs of the caste ladder, with a Dalit being made the President of India. Ram Vilas Paswan, a Dalit, heads the LJSP, an important partner in the ruling NDA. During his tours aimed at the 2019 general election, Shah makes it a point to have lunch (well publicised) one day in a dalit home.

In India’s social fabric of mixed hue, it is not possible to win elections on the support of one or two castes. Mayawati, for example, won elections in Uttar Pradesh whenever she could broaden her appeal beyond the jatav community of dalits to which she belongs. But Mamata Banerjee’s appeal is subtler. It works on the ‘class animosity’ among castes, thus posing a challenge to the BJP strategy of appealing to an all-embracing Hindu identity. Last year, as there were minor skirmishes between Hindus and Muslims at Dhulagarh in Howrah district, BJP bent over backwards to give it a communal tinge but the Trinamool leader used a mix of her understanding of subaltern politics, and executive power, to deny BJP any leeway.

The answer to religious identity politics is the politics of subaltern identity. Nitish Kumar realised it as he introduced the mahadalit concept and re-embraced Lalu Yadav. But he has hung up his boots in opposition politics. In today’s scenario, if Modi’s BJP can face a serious contender in 2019, it has to be from Mamata Banerjee.