Round The States

New Delhi, 28 February 2008

Lalu’s Poll Express

MOST STATES ANGRY,  DISAPPOINTED

By Insaf

Lalu Prasad Yadav may boast of having scored “goal after goal” with his “populist” Railway budget, but most States are unhappy and fuming over being dribbled out. On Tuesday last, Lalu flagged off what is being described as his “Poll Express” on track General Election 2009.  With the scoreboard reading: passenger fares cut, petrol and diesel freight concessions, 53 new trains, 10 more fully-airconditioned Garib Raths, cleaner trains et al. The Railway Minister even crowed in the Lok Sabha during his marathon 2-hour presentation of his budget in Hindi: that he had turned Mungeri Lal ke haseen sapne into reality. Only in Bihar and a couple of other States such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala, could be some Chief Ministers’ justified response.  .

Of the 20 new line projects that Lalu announced for the country, 11 were for home State Bihar—a staggering 55 per cent and worse not financially viable. With 28 services allocated, Bihar again topped the list with 19 new train services, four extension of services and five increase in frequency of trains. Add to this two out of 10 Garib Raths announced are to run through Bihar. When confronted with his brazenly partisan approach to Bihar, Lalu responded: “Bihar has lagged behind for decades. There is a strong regional imbalance. I am only trying to correct that.”

What about Orissa, asks Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. The rail budget doesn’t meet the aspirations of his people. “Where is the Garib Rath between Bhubaneshwar and Ranchi for the poor of my State?” he wants to know. The State, he asserts has been “historically” neglected in railway expansion and this time is no exception. While the State asked for Rs 1,330 crore, the rail budget has allocated only Rs 972 crore. West Bengal too has been “ignored’, according to the CPI, whose members led by Gurudas Dasgupta, walked out of the Lok Sabha in protest. The trains, it feels, are “between Patna and Chennai” and the budget is “parochial”.     

Equally livid is Jammu and Kashmir’s erstwhile Chief Minister, Farooq Abdullah. He ridiculed Lalu’s claim that the rail link to Kashmir would be completed by 2009. Impossible, he asserted, and added that it’s taken more than two decades for the line to reach Udhampur from Jammu. Farooq Abdullah even accuses Lalu of “befooling” the people of the State. He added: “The work on providing rail link to Katra town, base for Vaishno Devi temple near Jammu, is yet to be completed.” It was, therefore, absurd for Lalu to promise that he would complete the entire railway line from Katra to Qazigund.   Coming days will tell how many other CMs join the band wagon.    

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Darjeeling On The Boil

Darjeeling continues to be on the boil. The Gorkha Janmukti Movement (GJM) is adamant that it would not allow the “king of the Hills” Subhas Ghising to have his way anymore. The GJM’s message through protests running into the second week is clear: Neither will it let the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council’s erstwhile Chairman and presently Administrator to return to the hills nor will it settle for anything short of a separate State. Not only have Ghising’s plans to replace his autonomous Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council with the Gorkha Hill Council under the Sixth Schedule gone awry, but both the Centre and the State have been forced to rethink strategy. Intelligence reports have warned the Union home Ministry against any haste in granting the special status to Darjeeling hills, given the distinctive geographical location of the region, wherein a thin strip ‘Chicken’s Neck’; separates China and Bangladesh and connects the North-East. Any decision without a consensus could set the Hills ablaze and give the neighbours a chance to fish in troubled waters!

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No Hindi In Mumbai City Hall?

Maharashtra and its Capital, Mumbai, appear to be limping back to normal after the turmoil triggered by Raj Thackeray. Many apprehended fresh trouble when Bal Thackeray demanded that Marathi must remain the official language of the Mumbai Municipal Corporation and sounded the bugle against a proposal to publish the Corporation’ papers in Hindi as well. This was viewed as giving impetus to nephew Raj Thackeray’s agitation against the ‘north Indians’. But the BJP defused the situation by playing a faithful partner and supporting Bala Saheb’s stand. It has openly come out against the Hindi proposal on the ground of it being a part of the “divisive politics” of the Congress. With the proposal expected to come up in the Corporation’s meeting next week, Sena corporators have been asked to “safeguard Marathi” in the city hall. Will they be able to stall Hindi?

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Tripura Creates Electoral History

Tripura has created electoral history in India. This tiny State in the North-East which had gone to the polls on Saturday last had an incredible voter turnout of about 92 per cent. Polling at some booths went on till 11.15 pm, much past the 4 p.m. deadline as hundreds of voters were still in queue. And, the State went to polls with 100 per cent voter identity cards, the first for any North-Eastern State. Moreover, the good news is that polling passed off peacefully, something which the State hadn’t witnessed in the past two decades. Though there were more companies of the Central Police Force this time around, the five working groups monitoring election process in Delhi did not receive any complaint. Reason enough for the Election Commission to cheer. But, perhaps, it will wait till it conducts the elections in Meghalaya and Nagaland due to be held next week.

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 MP High Court Lifts Ban on  Jodhaa

 Film buffs in Madhya Pradesh have reason to rejoice. The State government’s ban on screening of “Jodhaa Akbar” was quashed by the High Court on Tuesday last. The ban was imposed last Friday following protests by Kshatriyas, who had threatened to burn cinemas screening the Mughal period drama. Their grouse: the film distorted history and hurt their sentiments. However, the division bench viewed the protests, in the form of two theatres being attacked, as not “so intense that it could disrupt peace in the State.” It upheld UTV Software Communications’ petition against the ban and noted that the government’s decision was in violation of the Fundamental rights of citizens. Some freedoms are eternal.---INFA

 (Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)