Now that she’s shed her reserve and decided to go the whole hog, Sonia Gandhi is springing surprises every day. She disarmed Sharad Pawar with her candid comments on her party’s electoral prospects when she met him for that famous cup of tea last week. Much to Pawar’s shock, she was brutally frank. The initiative is with them (the BJP), she apparently admitted and added that they had the advantage of allies, a well-oiled machinery and sentiment. She said she had already made changes in the Congress set-up and would be making more. She feared, however, that it may be too late.

Sonia went armed with facts and figures and, putting their heads together, the two did a state-by-state assessment of the Congress’ strengths and weaknesses and places where the NCP could make a difference.

The meeting left Pawar stunned. More so because she told him that Manmohan Singh would negotiate the seat sharing arrangement with the NCP. Now Singh knows next to nothing about Maharashtra and its demography. By keeping her Maharashtra stalwarts out of the discussions, Sonia seems to have handed the state to Pawar on a platter.

That sick feeling

For the past five years, Atal Behari Vajpayee has been the victim of rumours of ill-health. Last week, L.K. Advani was stung for the first time. A story about a supposed heart attack spread like wildfire, causing the Sensex to plunge, the BJP grapevine to buzz and Advani to get that haunted feel.

It all started with the deputy prime minister’s no-show at Vajpayee’s rally in Hyderabad during the party’s national executive. His absence was initially attributed (by none other than his own party leaders) to a fit of pique because his cut-outs were missing from the venue. Actually, Advani was in bed with viral fever.

The next day, he had to change his plans suddenly because of Janata Dal leader R.K. Hegde’s death. He flew to Bangalore to condole with the family. When he didn’t return to Delhi as scheduled, rumours began that he had suffered a heart attack and his residence was swamped with phone calls.

The episode became the conversation centerpiece at the banquet he hosted for his counterpart from Singapore the day after. All the guests inquired after his health. One of them even joked that the Vajpayee malaise had transferred to Advani. Vajpayee, who was standing within earshot of the many solicitous enquiries, must have empathised with Advani’s discomfiture.

Mix and match

The most unlikely political match that’s being pushed in this season of merry alliances is between the Congress and Kalyan Singh’s Rashtriya Kranti Party. And the matchmaker is none other than Singh’s confidante, Kusum Rai. A few days after Congress leader Subodh Kant Sahay wished Singh on his birthday with a bouquet of flowers and an invitation to join the ‘‘secular front’’, Rai got the former BJP chief minister to talk to Sonia Gandhi on the phone. The next step was a secretive, two-hour one-on-one meeting between Rai and Sonia.

Rai opened channels to the Congress several months ago through Priyanka Vadra. But it is only now, when Singh is actively negotiating a homecoming with the BJP, that Rai is openly pushing the Congress connection. She knows it’s all over for her once Singh is back in the BJP.