India This Week

Pranab’s austerity overdrive; composer Vishal Dadlani’s take on Shivaji; and Anil Ambani’s spat with the media

Prime Minister Mamnohan Singh’s silence during the high drama in the last Cabinet meeting on 10 September which saw Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee coming under fire from a section of his Cabinet colleagues for his austerity drive, has left many surprised.

Though Mukherjee, backed by the party High Command, ultimately had his way and the same ministers who sought to ridicule him fell in line with what the Gandhi family set out, many believe there would not have been much fuss had the PM overtly sided with the Congress veteran at the outset.

“He (Manmohan Singh) chose to remain silent. Perhaps, he thought Pranab  Mukherjee would handle it,” says a minister, choosing to remain anonymous.

Interestingly, two of the ministers belonging to the Congress—who joined Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, Renewable Energy Minister Farooq Abdullah and Textiles Minister Dayanidhi Maran in countering Mukherjee—are said to be pretty close to the PM.

The PM’s silence in such a context is being seen by many as a helping hand to those who trained their guns at the Finance Minister.

Although the minister refuses to see any such motive in the PM’s silence, he agrees that Singh, who was presiding over the cabinet meeting, could have made things easier for Mukherjee by intervening in his favour.

In view of the differences between the PM and the Finance Minister right from the formation of the ministry during the second term of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government (Mukherjee, for example, was not Singh’s choice for Finance Minister), the PM’s silence at a time when his lieutenants were attacking Mukherjee could well have been premeditated.

Sources say even the promptness with which Mukherjee seized the opportunity in asking SM Krishna and Shashi Tharoor to vacate their five-star accommodation—despite the fact that it is the PM who is the leader of the Council of Ministers—has not gone down well with Singh. Mukherjee is learnt to have talked to Sonia Gandhi, and not the PM, before asking Krishna and Tharoor to quit five-star hotels.

As austerity has become the order of the day in the Congress, the cold war in the UPA continues unabated.

Vishal Dadlani, Bollywood composer, has been dashing off emails asking for support in filing a public interest litigation against the construction of a huge Shivaji statue off Mumbai, in the Arabian Sea, along the lines of the Statue of Liberty. Earlier, he filed a PIL against the media coverage of the 26/11 attacks.

Q Isn’t it important for a city to have world class monuments?

A It would be better to match accomplishments first and showpieces later. The Statue of Liberty was a gift, not a folly. This is money that can be used in a million ways to help Mumbai. Make buses work. Make sure we don’t have any encroachments and prevent terrorist attacks.

Q Some would say you are being disrespectful to Shivaji by terming the statue a wasteful expenditure…

A Shivaji was possibly the greatest historical figure in Maharashtra. Because he was a wise, able administrator, I don’t think even he would’ve approved of a scheme costing us Rs 350 crore. And that is the estimated budget… we could be talking up to Rs 500, 700 maybe 1,000 crore.

Q What has been the response to your email?

A Unbelievable. Every single person I know is supporting it. With any public movement, it has to be a general sentiment. For whatever it’s worth, I can’t voice my opinions on a PIL. It has to be in the interest of the public and the public has to care about it.

Q You could be making yourself vulnerable to hooliganism.

A I want to be very careful about how I word the petition because my intention is clear, which is the need to stop wasteful expenditure. I’m a Maharashtrian as much as the next guy, I’ve lived here for 34 years. I speak Marathi fluently. I would like to honour Shivaji’s memory. But not at the cost of the people.

Anil Ambani is known to be friendly with the media, but he isn’t shy of a fight with the press when it comes to it. Even if it happens to be veteran journalist Vir Sanghvi. Four days after Sanghvi wrote an Independence Day column wondering why Ambani made headlines on a daily basis (among other concerns regarding the battling brothers), he received a giant legal notice from the man’s offices. Sanghvi, a prolific Twitter user, wrote, ‘Hear Anil Ambani has sent 18 legal notices to people who did not agree with his view. Trying to decipher mine…’. A few hours later, he wrote, ‘Anil Ambani wants me to remove the article about the Ambani brothers’ battle from my website. Can’t these guys take criticism?’  Three weeks on, the column is still up, with comments clearly in support of Sanghvi. One goes, ‘…Somebody should inform him that by [sending you a legal notice] he has struck a fundamental disagreement on basics of democracy…’ Sanghvi’s reply: ‘Except that I can’t afford to take page one ads in every newspaper in the country to ask him that question!’

Anil AmbaniPranab MukherjeeVishal Dadlani