The Congress party was quick to demand resignation of the three BJP Ministers in Karnataka — Laxman Savadi, CC Patil and Krishna Palemar — caught on camera watching a pornographic film clip on their mobile phones. To preempt any adverse effect on the party’s fortune in the ongoing polls in Uttar Pradesh, the three Ministers, too, obliged the party high command.
But the Opposition, which had tasted blood by now, demanded more and battled on the streets of Bangalore. In the capital, party gladiators roughed it out in the television studios. Those fielded by the BJP pointed out that while it was still to be verified whether the clip was a porn film, Congress Minister in Rajasthan Mahipal Maderna was actually caught on the camera in a seedy CD. This made a TV commentator quip, “This is the difference; while the BJP pays heavily for a virtual crime, the Congress gets away cheaply with a real act.”
Lohia ke log
The 2012 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh may prove to be the last battle for the followers of Ram Manohar Lohia, also called Lohia Ke Log. There are several of them in the battlefield who were part of Samajwadi Yuvjan Sabha in the late 1960s and 1970s, which was a force to reckon with in the students union politics, especially in Allahabad University and Banaras Hindu University.
However, they are not necessarily fighting under the banner of Samajwadi Party but have travelled all over. Sudhindra Bhadauria is in BSP, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi for long has been the Muslim face for BJP, whereas there are Mohan Prakash and Chanchal, both charismatic presidents of Banaras Hindu University, who are now helmsmen for the Congress. Lohia, who thrived on anti-Congressism, must be turning in his grave seeing his pupils working hard to revive Congress.
