Reddy steady

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister K Kiran Kumar Reddy has been making frequent trips to Delhi these days. He is desperately seeking clearance from the central leadership for a Cabinet expansion, and filling up large number of vacancies in corporations. He has got no clearance so far. The Congress high command is said to be unhappy with Reddy's non-performance, which has added to the party's woes in the crucial state. This is said to be giving jitters to the Chief Minister as he flies to and fro from Hyderabad to Delhi.

Campaign Conundrum

THE snub to Bihar BJP leaders from the Gujarat unit, in so far as campaigning for Gujarat elections are concerned, has been widely noticed. In an effort to control some damage, the central leadership has stepped in to include its leaders from Bihar to campaign in Himachal Pradesh, the other state going to the polls. Ravi Shankar Prasad and Shahnawaj Hussain have been included in the party's list of star campaigners for Himachal Pradesh. So have Uma Bharati and Varun Gandhi, who too were left out of Gujarat list. But three of the party's chief ministers — Manohar Parrikar, Arjun Munda and Jagadish Shettar — have been left out. Interestingly, while the Gujarat list does not include the name of Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister P K Dhumal, the Himachal list does have Narendra Modi as a star campaigner.

Getting into the groove

MORE than two months after he took over as the Union Home Minister, Sushilkumar Shinde has finally started acclimatizing himself to his job. In the last few days, Shinde has been visiting a number of border areas, to have a better understanding of the issues. The minister would be on the India-Bangladesh border near Dhubri in Assam, which was one of the areas affected by the violence in the state a couple of months back. The visit to Assam follows separate trips to Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh region and Punjab. A visit to the Wagah border is also being planned in the near future.

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