Art of matter

CULTURE minister Maneka Gandhi’s acerbic style often obscures the fact that what she says makes sound sense. Gandhi has ruffled feathers by trying to innovate change in the Museum of Modern Art. The minister has questioned the museum’s procedure for purchasing painting. For instance, of the 14,900 paintings owned by the museum 7,000 are the works of Bengali painter, Nandlal Bose. Gandhi has suggested that the Bose paintings be kept on display in a separate modern art museum in Calcutta for which Bengal chief minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya is only too happy to allocate land.

Gandhi also pointed out that the entire Rs 14 lakh museum budget for the year has been spent on buying four paintings of J. Swaminathan when the museum already has 27 works by the artist. To guard against charges of favouritism and any single region dominating the collection, Gandhi has expanded the museum committee from six to 28, including art critics, art historians and artists. Another commendable scheme is to institute a friends of the museum club since all over the world museum patrons are the best source for funding art.

Technical hitch

THE Vajpayee government has been liberally doling out post-retirement sinecures to favoured bureaucrats. Now, several senior secretaries to the GOI have an eye on the post of chairman Central Electricity Regulatory Authority, which has been vacant for the last 11 months. The plus point of the job is that the chairman has a five-year tenure and is based in Delhi. Former finance secretary Ajit Kumar who is to retire shortly is keen on the job. So is the power secretary Ashok Basu and the commerce secretary Prabir Sengupta.

The problem in appointing a superannuated secretary is that one of the members on the selection panel. E.A.S. Sarma, former secretary, revenue who resigned last year after differences with the government, has written a letter stating that the post should go to a technocrat and not to a generalist. It remains to be seen whether the powers that be will remove the inconvenient Sarma from the selection board or overrule him.

Mind your language

WHILE presiding over Hindi Week celebrations, HRD minister Murli Manohar Joshi declared that all files in his ministry would be written in future in Hindi. Two of the three secretaries in the ministry, M.K. Kaw and B.N. Chaturvedi, who are both from north India, were happy to fall in line. But the secretary woman and child welfare, Vaidyanath Iyer, has a tough time coping and keeps referring to Kao for accurate translations. Officers from the south in other ministries to whom the files are forwarded cannot decipher the sanskritised Hindi favoured by the two HRD secretaries. In fact, a senior bureaucrat from Tamil Nadu has demanded that English translations should be provided by the HRD ministry.

The minister for social welfare, Satya Narain Jatiya, also wants all his files in Hindi, but since the translation work is slow the files awaiting his signature are piling up. Jatiya, in fact, seems more interested in Hindi than in his portfolio. He has placed his Hindi poems on the notice boards at Shastri Bhavan so that the babus can appreciate his literary talents.

Smoke signals

WHILE waiting to meet defence minister George Fernandes and visiting US defence secretary Donald Rummsfeld outside South Block, journalists refrained initially from smoking since the Supreme Court judgement the day before had called for a ban on smoking in public places.

But the court’s ruling, did not affect a senior defence ministry official who lit up his cigarette in full view. Taking courage from his example several newsmen followed suit. An agitated private secretary to Fernandes ran up to the official to remind him of the Supreme Court verdict, but the secretary refused to stub out his cigarette. ‘‘When they pass it as a bill, then we will see,’’ he remarked breezily. He seemed ignorant of the fact that the law is already in force in the Capital for the Delhi government has banned smoking in public places.

Naidu’s Oom mantra

WHEN rural development minister Venkaiah Naidu explained at a media get-together that he had started an ‘Oom’ scheme for all drinking water projects in the country, a section of his audience assumed with dismay that the BJP was trying to communalise even development work. Naidu, quickly explained that ‘Oom’ was an acronym for ‘‘own, operate and maintain’’ a philosophy of self-help at the panchayat level which he is trying to introduce in all projects in his ministry, from drinking water, to roads and sanitation.

Naidu, who was earlier very visible as the BJP spokesman, joked that many thought he was going into vanvas by taking charge of such a low profile ministry. In fact, to his credit, Naidu has proved to be an extremely effective minister who has devised several imaginative schemes for rural upliftment. The new buzz word ‘‘convergence’’ applies as much to his ministry which is liaising with other social sector ministries as it does to IT and communication ministries.

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