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Deep Throat

A regular column on the essential buzz

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Deep Throat
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Haryana
This Just In

Ex-Congress MP and steel baron Naveen Jindal seems convinced that he must push through his two-year-old mission of turning media baron, especially after his infamous sting on Zee network went kaput. Depending on which version you choose, Jindal lent funds or invested in the Focus media group that broadcasts seven news channels. The media group is wrapping up its operations and the last two channels are scheduled to go off air at end of this month. Word is the I&B ministry has decl­ined to renew its licences. Not one to give up, Jindal is planning a fresh foray under the name ‘News World India’. Jindal, who has a habit of briefing editors and reporters directly, has pumped even more money into the operations of the new channels. The channels have seen a high attrition rate among its senior editorial staff reportedly due to disagreements over programm­ing related to the Zee media group.

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Karnataka
Retired Hurt

R.K. Pachauri’s ignominious ejection from TERI following charges of sexual harassment of a 29-year-old woman colleague has received just publicity, but not so his “temporary exit” from Bangalore International Centre of which he was president and founder-trustee, for the same offence. BIC, which is modelled on the lines of the India International Centre and India Habitat Centre in Delhi, was launched a decade ago and is currently housed in TERI’s Bangalore campus in Domlur, pending the construction of its own building. Pachauri, 75, played a key role in the thinktank’s birth and growth, even getting A.P.J. Abdul Kalam to inaugurate its activities. But the ongoing kerfuffle has seen him voluntarily “step aside” till his name is cleared.

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Madhya Pradesh
A Secret Language

The 10th ‘Vishwa Hindi Sam­melan’ held in Bhopal from September 10-12 could well have been an RSS ‘chintan shivir’.  Everything was secret, right from the delegates’ list to the names of the recipients of the ‘Vishwa Hindi Samman’. The various sessions were out of bounds for the media and over a 100 burly bjp/rss men were dep­loyed to ensure that no mediaperson could sneak in. The parting kick was Union home minister Rajnath Singh’s revelation that “Hindi could not become the national language because of the week-kneed post-Independence leadership (read Nehru)”!!

Jammu & Kashmir
To The Trauma Centre

Is an AIIMS-like institute coming up in J&K? Will it be located in Jammu or Kashmir? Finance minister Arun Jaitley announced it in his Union budget. In the ‘Agenda for Alliance’, CM Mufti Moham­med Sayeed stated that it would be located in the Valley, while the IIM and IIT would be based in Jammu. Subsequently, Jammu held a series of bandhs in protest. In July, deputy CM Nir­mal Singh rushed to Delhi and met Union health minister J.P. Nadda, who released an ambiguous statement that the Centre would set up health facilities both in Jammu as well as Kashmir. This doused the ire mom­entarily, but an RTI reply saying his ministry has neither received any order for two AIIMS-like institutes nor is there any inf­ormation on the funds sanctioned for the purpose could ignite passions again.

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Heard: North Block buzzing with rumours that a technocrat is likely to helm the FinMin after 2016 budget, a la Manmohan under PVN

Overheard: Lawyers of sacked IPS officer Sanjiv Bhatt—who’s filed a case against Amit Shah, Modi—getting hate mail calling them ‘traitors’. 

Contributed by Ushinor Majumdar, Pritam Sengupta, Bula Devi, K.S. Shaini and Dilip Bobb

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