Pre-Truth — snappy, witty and significant snippets from the world of politics and government.
Brono is Lalu’s new pet but you can’t offer it sweets
Brono, the new Labrador pet at Lalu Yadav’s official residence in Patna, has become the cynosure of all eyes in the family as also in the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). Since the pet arrived a month ago, Lalu has grown very fond of it and his party leaders have obviously noticed it. Visitors have started bringing sweets and other eatables for Brono. A notice board has now been put up at the 10, Circular Road residence of the Yadav family, saying: “Don’t offer sweets to Brono”. The family has realised that it is unhealthy for the dog, which is just three months old, to eat so much sweets every day.
Rajya Sabha MP Ram Shakal is President’s ‘favourite’
Newly nominated Rajya Sabha MP Ram Shakal has caught the attention of many of his colleagues in Parliament. A three-time Lok Sabha MP, he was nominated to the Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh as one of the four eminent personalities in mid-July this year. In less than two months of his entry to the upper house, Shakal has been picked by the government to travel with President Ram Nath Kovind to Europe in early September. It is not often that an MP is chosen by the government to accompany the President on a state visit within such a short period of being nominated to the house. Many in the BJP are attributing it to beginner’s luck while a few other are having heartburn, too.
Also read: Rahul Gandhi pictures in Germany: Was Congress account hacked?
When politicians flocked to judge’s house
Supreme Court judge N.V. Ramana, the third in line to become the Chief Justice of India, is a man liked by many, especially those in power circles. In 2015, when his eldest daughter Mohana got married, the who’s who of Indian politics and the judiciary were in attendance. In 2017, when his second daughter Tanuja got married, the attendance was similar. Ramana’s guests cut across party lines and power structures. Recently, the judge held a shraadh for his parents in Delhi and even that had political figures in attendance, raising many eyebrows.
Law students upset over Sudha Bharadwaj’s arrest
Amid a raging controversy over the arrest of lawyer Sudha Bharadwaj and four other civil rights activists, her students at National Law University, Delhi, were upset as their classes were disrupted. Bharadwaj, a visiting professor, was teaching a course on ‘Law and Justice in a Globalised World’ with a focus on tribal rights. Since she is currently under house arrest, her teaching assistant Aniruddha Jairam has stepped in to take her classes. Anirudha is the son of former union minister and Congress leader Jairam Ramesh.
SP leader explained to Vajpayee why women’s quota was a bad idea
Days after the demise of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, politicians from across party lines continue to talk about him. At a day-long all-party meet convened by the Election Commission Monday to discuss electoral reforms, senior Samajwadi Party leader and Rajya Sabha MP Ram Gopal Yadav recalled how he once had a detailed discussion with Vajpayee on women’s reservation in legislature. Yadav had told Vajpayee how all top elected leaders would be wiped out if such reservations were brought in, and nobody would ever have the chance to become a national leader. He also narrated how he told Vajpayee that he might have the luxury of having four seats to choose from to contest, but not everybody did, and such reservations would, thus, be unfair. Incidentally, the Vajpayee government had introduced and re-introduced the women’s reservation bill several times between 1998 and 2004, but in vain.
(Contributors: Kumar Anshuman, Ruhi Tewari, and Apurva Vishwanath)
Also read: Why Narendra Modi is angry with this clueless minister