Shaken to the roots

...by the way

 

Shaken to the roots

 

Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh and his Ministry were hit by an earthquake when CAG Vinod Rai in his report on MGNREGA criticised the implementation of the scheme. In what was considered to be an unprecedented move, the overactive Ramesh had himself called upon the CAG (on the grounds that he is a constitutional authority and should therefore not be calling on Ministers) and asked him to perform a ‘performance audit’ on the government’s rural employment guarantee scheme. It was the first of its kind since the CAG is primarily in the job of undertaking financial audits. The two appeared to have hit it off rather well, with Vinod Rai later returning the compliment and inviting Jairam Ramesh to deliver a lecture along with other ‘intellectuals’ at Mussourie. So when the CAG’s report became public, Jairam could not believe his eyes. The Minister was obviously hopeful that a pat on the back from the normally critical CAG would push up his stock in the eyes of Sonia and Rahul Gandhi. But since Vinod Rai has not missed a single opportunity to put the Government on the mat, he used this opportunity to reinforce his point. To give him credit, Jairam is one of those ministers who has no ego or protocol in walking the extra mile or in approaching Opposition party leaders to agree to his bills. For example in the case of the land reforms bill, he first met Sitaram Yechury, then Prakash Karat and others to ask for their support. He has developed a close association with the fiery and unpredictable Mamata Banerjee even though the grapevine has it that Sonia Gandhi has been frowning on Jairam’s overtures. Sometimes it’s a case of ‘aa beil mujhe maar’ and Jairam appears to be a classic example of this. g