Empire struck

The MEA has ended up paying $14 million for a 65-year lease for 9, Kensington Palace Gardens, residence of the Indian High Commissioner in London. Repairs on the heritage building owned by the Crown cost an additional $4 million. Questions have been asked whether it was really worth the while of our Foreign Office to retain this exclusive address when richer countries like Canada have opted to relocate their embassies.

The MEA’s manner of getting even with the Brits is to put an even steeper price on the British High Commissioner’s residence in New Delhi at 2, Rajaji Marg. The Indian government recently issued a notice to the British High Commission that the price of the Lutyens-designed bungalow and large garden, is Rs 126 crore for the lease. There is an additional 50 per cent yearly ground rent. The total comes to a staggering Rs 189 crore. In comparison, the London property seems fairly reasonable since it cost us only Rs 80 crore. The Indian government’s excuse for the delay of well over a decade after the last lease expired in arriving at the property’s price is that since there is no commercial property in the vicinity it took a while to evaluate the price of the land!

Mystery messenger

Considering the recent bonhomie between them, political observers were taken aback when the Prime Minister took a crack at Advani’s expense in Parliament recently. Vajpayee remarked only half in jest that the home minister got so worried when he and General Musharraf took inordinately long in their one-to-one meeting that he sent an emissary to find out just what was going on. The question is who was Advani’s emissary, because no ordinary official would have dared butt in during the high level talks. Since Brajesh Mishra was out of the picture, the emissary had to be one of two suspects.

Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, who throughout the summit had to shuttle between Musharraf, the PM and Advani, or Sudheendra Kulkarni, the joint secretary in the PMO who occupies a very special position and feels he is entitled to enter even the sanctum sanctorum without permission.

Bank balance

Pramod Mahajan claims that his son Rahul Mahajan’s firm, Integral Productions Limited, paid up the entire amount of Rs 8.93 crore it owed to Prasar Bharati (PB). But the public broadcaster is unable to encash the Western Cooperative Bank’s one crore guarantee on behalf of Mahajan’s firm, for the production of the Truck Dina Din programme for Doordarshan. The bank says the guarantee is genuine, but unfortunately its accounts have been frozen because of the Ketan Parekh scam.

Displaying uncharacteristic vigilance, PB, has served a legal notice on the bank and is threatening to start criminal proceedings. It has also passed a new rule that guarantees from cooperative banks will no longer be acceptable, for these are the banks most vulnerable to the pulls and pressures of politicians. (Remember the Madhavpura bank and the Bank of Karad)

Golf apart
The government plans to disinvest the 150 odd properties run by the ITDC all over the country, the sole exception being the Centaur hotel in Srinagar scenically located besides the Dal Lake. Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, a golf enthusiast, is a frequent visitor to the hotel and has demanded that it remain with the state government. In accordance with his wishes, the Centaur, Srinagar, is to be converted into a golf club.

Missing Mulayam
Laloo Prasad Yadav held a maha dharna in Delhi to counter the bandh organised against his wife Rabri Devi’s regime in Patna on the same day. Laloo’s rally protesting the UTI scam and the saffronisation of education was meant to demonstrate opposition unity against the Vajpayee government. Representatives from the Congress, CPI, CPM, AIADMK and RPI turned up. As well as independent MPs like Chandra Shekhar and D.P. Yadav, who has had his differences with Laloo in the past. The notable absentee was Mulayam Singh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party.

Chandra Shekhar inquired about the absence of the SP, particularly since just recently Mulayam and the Left bonded together to form the People’s Front. A senior left politician remarked helplessly. ‘‘I don’t know what sort of secularism Mulayam practices. He never seems to want to demonstrate against the government.’’ If Laloo had wanted the SP to participate in his dharna, he should have known better than to mention the UTI matter as the issue for holding the maha dharna. Since on this at least the government and Mulayam’s party are on the same side.

Diplomatic moves

The new US ambassador to India Robert Blackwill arrived a month back but he has still not formally presented his credentials to the President K.R. Narayanan, since the latter is indisposed. The Indian government has, however, permitted Blackwill to function as a full-fledged ambassador without first going through the official ceremony. After all, a similar courtesy was extended to our man in the US, Lalit Man Singh, who came to Washington during the transition period in the government.

Blackwill was fascinated by the friendly interaction between senior leaders of various political parties at opposition leader Subbarami Reddy party in his honour last Friday. Their behaviour was in sharp contrast to their hostility towards each other in Parliament.

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