Doctoring the query

Feeling left out

In the middle of each page of the 2008 Lok Sabha calendar, there is a small picture of President Pratibha Patil, Vice-President Hamid Ansari and Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee. Some Opposition MPs quibble that until now the calendar was not personality-based, and if photographs of these three were to be included, then why not pictures of the Leader of the House and the Leader of the Opposition as well? They feel that the three personalities have been selected simply because they belong to the Congress-Left alliance. Neither former president Abdul Kalam nor then vice-president Bhairon Singh Shekhawat figured in the Lok Sabha calendar during their five years in office.

Commissioning his own plan

Following a Delhi High Court order, the Delhi Municipal Corporation commissioned a redevelopment plan for the historic Jama Masjid precinct in November 2005. The courts, the Delhi Urban Arts Commission and the Delhi government, were all involved in the proposed model, which was finally conceptualised by a leading private architect. Eminent historians, urban planners, economists and residents were consulted. The whole plan was submitted in two volumes in September last year, but the process of implementation has not yet begun. A municipal deputy commissioner seems to feel that he has the power to veto the view of expert town planners and formulate an alternative proposal of his own, despite his lack of professional expertise.