Meanwhile, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who should have appropriated some of the credit for this major milestone in Indian space technology, got left behind. His messages of congratulations were belated, since he was away in Tokyo when the satellite took off, and in Washington when it landed on the moon.
Minor slip, big fall
The Egyptian Ambassador hosted a lunch in honour of President of Egypt Hosni Mubarak’s wife Suzanne at his residence. BJP MP and former deputy chairperson of the Rajya Sabha Najma Heptullah, who moderated the discussion on the state of women in Egypt, remarked in her speech that she was extremely sorry that she had to cancel her recent trip to Egypt because she had slipped on the treadmill while exercising. Heptullah added only half in jest that those who were in politics know full well that a small slip can often lead to a very big fall. Some of the high-powered women guests assumed that she was referring to herself, since Heptullah’s political career had taken a nosedive after she incurred Sonia Gandhi’s displeasure for a minor slip. Others thought she was empathising with her former party colleague Margaret Alva, who now finds herself in the boondocks after speaking out of turn about the sale of party tickets.
Transfer of authority?
The Jaipur civic authorities recently transferred a sweeper to a different ward since it had received numerous complaints that he was not cleaning satisfactorily. The transferred sweeper complained to the Election Commission that his transfer was in violation of election rules. Amazingly, the State Election Commission took the complaint very seriously and promptly issued a notice to the Jaipur Development Authority, calling for an explanation and asking for the name of the officer who had ordered the transfer. The EC verbally asked for the sweeper to be transferred back to his original ward.
... contd.
