SHIMLA: Ram Bilas Sharma is a tall teller, with taller tales. Not surprisingly, the over-6-ft BJP politician from Mahendragarh, Haryana, is much in demand in these slander-sloshed elections. After campaigning in Suchetgarh near the Jammu and Kashmir border, Sharma is now in Shimla to canvass for Himachal Vikas Congress (HVC) candidate Dhani Ram Shandil.

The excited HVC workers say ``he is as good as Sushma Swaraj''. Not to mention Pramod Mahajan. In Ballag village in Shimla district, the bearded Sharma enraptured the audience with a series of anti-Sonia anecdotes. First he referred to her as ``the Italy India Company'', adding ``we were once ruled by the East India Company''. Then he related an incident which reportedly occurred during her campaign trip to Rohtak.

According to him, in one speech, Sonia had to make a reference to Haryana Congress chief Bhupinder Singh Hooda, also known as Bhai Hooda. Apparently, she said ``Behuda (vulgar)'' instead. Sharma alsoimprovises on a famous Bobby song to get his message across. ``Vote padne ke baad wo kahegi, `Main Italy chali jaungi, tum dekhte rahiyo'.''

The audience roared, but the joke may finally be on Sharma. All through, people confused him with another Ram B(V)ilas: Paswan.

HAMIRPUR: Even the ubiquitous table fan at an election meeting is not an occasion to be missed for a jibe at Sonia Gandhi. The BJP's Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister, Prem Kumar Dhumal, recently went to a public meeting at Hamirpur in which table fans had been placed at various vantage points. Guess what would have happened in case Sonia came to address you, he asked.

And went on to answer: the gust of wind from the fans would blow away the paper from which Sonia reads out her speech, and she would be dumb struck.

RAIPUR: There's a lot of adventure in the great Indian democratic exercise. Polling parties have embarked on an arduous journey on bullock carts, elephants, boats, tractors and at some places even on foot toreach several remote voting centres across Chhatisgarh region for the September 25 elections. Election personnel will have to trek more than 10 km and wade through a number of small rivulets on their way to at least 90 polling stations in Raipur, officials said.

-- Sukhmani Singh, Bajinder Pal Singh and Agencies