E-Paper
Off the record
On her first meeting with the University Grants Commission (UGC), Higher Education Secretary Vibha Puri Das was accompanied by two directors on special instruction from the Ministry.
Advantage HRD ministry
On her first meeting with the University Grants Commission (UGC), Higher Education Secretary Vibha Puri Das was accompanied by two directors on special instruction from the Ministry. The directors were to ensure that the UGC did not take advantage of the fact that Puri is new to the job. According to HRD sources, the UGC had earlier tried to get favours or commitments out of new education secretaries. To avoid this, the directors were asked to be with her during the entire duration of the meeting with the UGC.
Taste of the future
Apart from the 12 pacts signed between the two countries, India warmed up to the new Bhutanese king Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck and the delegation on his maiden State-visit to India in many ways. Special care was taken to make the banquet hosted by President Pratibha Patil at Rashtrapati Bhavan a royal affair. Officials at the Rashtrapati Bhavan made sure that the Indian band that played on the occasion had been trained to play three popular Bhutanese songs. The menu too left the Bhutanese delighted: achaari fish tikka, murg hazarvi, gobi mattar kaju, dal bukhara, asparagus soup and gajar ka halwa.
Some teething troubles here
What would be the viability of providing a dentist with attendant facilities in Saudi Arabia during the Haj season for the Hajis? That is what’s worrying officials at the Ministry of External Affairs. The suggestion had come from Saifuddin Soz, who was the Haj goodwill delegation leader to Saudi Arabia some time ago. The problem was that he wrote a letter to Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor. Now Tharoor has left standing instructions that every letter sent to him must be replied to. So arose the need to discuss the viability of a dentist before a formal reply can be sent to Soz.
Luck comes in twos
Political circles in the capital are busy trying to find out the reason for Nitin Gadkari being made the BJP president. A political analyst pointed out that since the BJP is a party with a difference, only a leader in whose state the party lost two consecutive assembly elections could make it to the top post. Vasundhara Raje had to quit from her post after the BJP lost in Rajasthan and B.C. Khanduri lost the chief minister’s chair for the poor performance of the party in Uttarakhand. But Gadkari made it to the top post after the BJP alliance lost twice in Maharashtra.
No margin for error
Union Rural Development Minister C.P. Joshi is upbeat after his win over Indian Premier League commissioner and BCCI vice-president Lalit Modi for the post of Rajasthan Cricket Association president. But the fact that the victory margin was narrow is still giving him the jitters. “It was a huge risk,” he said recently. Perhaps the humiliation he would have faced in case of a defeat as Union minister and also as the Rajasthan Congress president is still on his mind.
