A Week, A Month...
Ever since union minister Ghulam Nabi Azad made his statement implying a T-decision will take much longer— "One month does not mean 30 days and one week does not mean seven days" —four young men in Telangana have committed suicide fearing statehood is too distant a dream. Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy is in Delhi making the rounds of Azad's residence and of course meeting with Congress president Sonia Gandhi. The topic of discussion: Telangana again. A surprise visitor at Delhi has been K. Rosaiah, Kiran Kumar's predecessor and Tamil Nadu Governor. Apparently, Rosaiah has been called in to give his own opinion on statehood. After the Congress' success in the recent cooperative society polls, Kiran Kumar is in a buoyant mood. He has told the High Command that he could successfully control statehood agitations of the Telangana Joint Action Committee and maintain law and order in the State. The CM has reportedly expressed his opposition to the bifurcation of the state because river water sharing and Hyderabad would turn out to be major issues. A Telangana Territorial Council is also one of the options though it remains to be seen how Telangana statehood supporters react to the proposal.
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Do the Maths
Taking a cue from Ghulam Nabi Azad perhaps is PCC president Botsa Satyanarayana, who has tied himself up in knots with his remarks that nine Congress MLAs who are flirting with the YSR Congress would be expelled. Of course, Botsa being the smooth politician he is, retracted the statement later on. "All I had said was that MLAs who do not have respect for Congress and its president Sonia Gandhi could not be deemed Congressmen," Botsa defended himself. "I never said the nine MLAs were expelled. I only said that those who do not toe the party line are deemed to have been expelled." While Botsa spun his verbal web, the Congress at the centre is none too happy and asked the PCC chief to do the maths. If the nine MLAs were to be expelled, the AP government will be reduced to a minority. Since he is headed to Delhi next after Kiran Kumar, Botsa will surely get some lessons on controlling his shooting-his-mouth-off syndrome.
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Xeroxing Aadhar
A February 15 deadline fixed by oil companies linking Aadhar cards to subsidy on LPG cylinders has led to panic across the state. Serpentine queues at all Aadhar centres led to stampedes at various mandals as harried officials struggled to cope with the sheer volume. Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy has asked the centre for two more months to link Aadhar to the LPG subsidy considering the mad rush at the last minute. In Hyderabad and Ranga Reddy districts, centres ran out of forms. Applicants were asked to get photocopies. Since the Aadhar forms have unique numbers, it is obvious that such efforts would go wasted and the officials themselves did not have a clue as to how to handle the shortage of forms. What's even funnier is that constant migrations have revealed the fact that the 2011 census and numbers of people enrolling don't quite match. If only UID chairman Nandan Nilakeni had worked out an algorithm to attend to the unique population problems of India before plunging us all into this mess.
Just Google It
What is success? How can one be successful? Now this is a question whose answer everyone wants to know. Many of us spend years chasing management degrees in India and abroad or even part-time through institutes like IGNOU in order to achieve success. Some of us enrol for leadership courses which tell us that what we've done all our life is completely wrong. So give it a shot the other way round this time, the leadership gurus tells us. Are leaders born? Can they be made? Is one a team leader or an independent player, do you think rationally or emotionally? Is money the criteria for success? Or is it fame? Or is it the power to change society? Are you a Narayan Murthy who still makes his bed, puts his breakfast tray away and so on or a Nandan Nilakeni who has the whole of India believing that he will change their lives with an Aadhar card? Or do you constantly wonder how on earth the likes of Chetan Bhagat can be successful writers? Whatever it is, all your beliefs can now change. And as they say, nothing comes free of cost these days, especially success or the route to it. The Indian School of Business, Hyderabad, is hosting none other than the 'Love Guru' Deepak Chopra on March 1. The spiritual guru who is a friend to several Hollywood celebrities, singers (the late Michael Jackson included), sportspersons and international politicians, will share his pearls of wisdom in the City of Pearls. The guru will be holding a Soul of Leadership Programme on March 1 at ISB from 9.30 am to 5 pm. The tagline being, "If you focus on success, you'll have stress. But if you pursue excellence, success will be guaranteed." You can have all this gyaan for a whopping cost of Rs 50,000. Just to play spoilsport, I'd like to add that one can also Google seven steps to success and Deepak Chopra to get a fair idea of what the man wants to convey and save yourselves half a lakh. How do I know, you might ask? Well, I am a clandestine fan of Deepak Chopra's. But faced with the prospect of spending Rs 50,000, I'd say that I will settle for Narayan Murthy's advice any day. "The harder and harder I work, the more successful I am."
