A yagna for good luck

Ever since he completed his term as Punjab governor in 2015, Shivraj Patil has been leading a quiet life. He is barely seen or heard though he is spotted occasionally at Delhi’s India International Centre. But he was pulled out of semi-retirement last week, making a series of appearances on several television channels. Since Mr Patil was the home minister in the Congress-led UPA government, he was much sought after by the media for his reactions to the acquittal of all the accused in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast case. With the BJP launching an all-out offensive against the Congress for coining the term saffron terror and defaming all Hindus, no senior Congress leader or other former home ministers (P. Chidambaram and Sushil Kumar Shinde) were available for their views. Surprisingly, even former Madhya Pradesh chief minister and senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh, who never misses an opportunity to lash out at the BJP and the RSS for its divisive agenda, refrained from commenting on the court’s verdict. As a result, it was left to Mr Patil to defend the Congress even though he was asked to step down as home minister in 2008 following the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. Nevertheless, Mr Patil made a valiant attempt to counter BJP charges, stating that the Congress did not use the term Hindu terror and that the party was of the firm belief that terrorism has no religion and that all perpetrators of terror attacks must be punished.

It is well-known that senior Congress leader and Chhindwara MP Kamal Nath wants the party to project him as the chief ministerial candidate in the year-end Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections. His colleague Jyotiraditya Scindia is also in the race for the same post. But given the intense infighting in the party’s Madhya Pradesh unit, Congress president Rahul Gandhi has steered clear of taking a decision, keeping all aspirants on tenterhooks. But the CM-hopefuls have not given up trying. In fact, Mr Nath has taken a cue from former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Digvijay Singh, who recently completed a six-month-long Narmada parikrama, and sought divine intervention for a decision in his favour. Not only did Mr Nath put in an appearance during Mr Singh’s padyatra, he recently took a helicopter to Jhoteshwar to seek the blessings of Shankaracharya Swami Swaroopanand Saraswati. He also offered prayers at the Tripur Sundari temple and is learnt to have organised a yagna, apparently for good luck. It is now to be seen if Mr Nath’s prayers will be answered. It’s all in the hands of God and Mr Gandhi.

After coming to power in 2014, the Narendra Modi government has spared no efforts to lobby with the member countries of the United Nations to make Hindi one of its official languages but to little avail. At present, the UN has six official languages — English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and Arabic. All the documents published by the UN are printed in these languages. But getting the same status for Hindi is an uphill task as India’s demand must be supported by two-third members of the member countries. In fact, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj admitted that the government had not met with success while replying to questions in Parliament. Since India’s endeavours have not yielded results, the Modi government has settled for the second-best option, but at a price. It is shelling out nearly $2 million to hire a five-member staff (based in New York and Delhi) to translate and upload reports from the UN in Hindi on its official website and on the social media. Needless to say, the southern states, which have always opposed the imposition of Hindi by successive governments, will not be happy with this development.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi’s move to send his own team of observers to poll-bound states to give feedback on probable candidates has sent his own party members into a tizzy as those aspiring for tickets are not sure if they will make the cut. This has also confused the BJP, its main political rival. When Sonia Gandhi was party chief, there was certain predictability about this exercise as the observers deputed to recommend names of candidates and those seeking tickets enjoyed a cozy relationship. Their political rivals, too, had a fair idea of the names of Congress candidates, which enabled them to set their field in advance. They picked their own candidates accordingly and, in many cases, set up independents or even entered into secret deals with Congress contestants. Mr Gandhi broke with the tradition in the recent Gujarat elections and followed it up in poll-bound Karnataka, resulting in considerable resentment among the old timers. In fact, his selected observers have already been dispatched to Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh though these states are due to go to polls only in December. Predictably, both the contenders in the Congress and their opponents have been left to guess about the outcome of these visits.