The Election Commission, meanwhile, has called for a meeting on August 11 to decide the Assembly poll schedules for Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Mizoram. While the Kashmir poll may be in October, the other state elections are likely to be held mid-November.

Image correction

It is not just the techno savvy younger generation of politicians, like Omar Abdullah, who maintain a blog on the Internet, even Lalu Prasad Yadav has one. The latest buzz on Lalu’s blog is an explanation of what he actually meant when he asked Shah Rukh Khan to cast him in the part of a politician, if such a role crops up in one of his films. This is not because he is star struck, Lalu explains. It is because he wants to correct the wrong impression about politicians in Bollywood movies, where politicians are not taken seriously. In real life, people look up to politicians, Lalu claims.

Defining role

In Ahmedabad, Congress MP Rajiv Shukla declared that the responsibilities of a chief minister should be clearly defined so that the Centre is not always made the scapegoat. Whether it is terrorism, drought, inflation, law and order, inevitably the PM gets blamed, rather than the state chief minister. “Are chief ministers there just to allot land in their states?” he queried.