The Hindu Business Line : You can only milk a cow so long

EVEN as the Opposition is on an indefinite boycott, the Lalu logjam is refusing to clear. No resolution is in sight and the matter appears to be like stubborn fodder at the throat. Lalu wants to meet the apex court judges in private and have a word, but the common man is anxiously asking questions in public.

Kya hua?

Nothing happened, except that a lot of money meant for cattle fodder disappeared. How much money? Rs 950 crore, plus or minus some small change. Didn't the cattle complain? They mooed and booed like in normal times, because the cows and buffaloes that were supposed to have eaten the missing fodder didn't exist in the first place. Otherwise, they would have died, you see. So, there were cooked up as bills for medicine, and the twist in the tale is the funding of artificial insemination too that was not real!

I don't think Lalu would have taken all that fodder home?

True, that's too much. But the charges are that he is one among the many who siphoned off the funds, or milked the fodder account dry. "The money, which is reported to have been stolen over nearly 20 years, came from agricultural support programs aimed mainly at helping the 350 million Indians who live in extreme poverty," wrote John F. Burns in the New York Times, about eight years ago.

What does the Opposition want?

They say, Lalu must quit because he has been chargesheeted more than once. Parliament's proceedings have been routinely hindered because of this demand. He's not going but our representatives feel their ammo is over!

Isn't Manmohan saying anything?

As a soft-hearted skipper, he couldn't bear the sight of Lalu getting flogged. So he said there was no question of Lalu's quitting or being asked to resign. Quite unfortunate that he had to come in defence, many say; but Manmohan calls the stand of the Opposition `unfortunate.'

Somebody told me something in private!

That must be the secret of complexion shared by the model on the soap commercial on the TV. Perhaps, Lalu has seen too many of such ads, so he's going about telling everybody that he wants to meet the apex court judges in private.

Can you whisper to me the secret he'd tell them?

Well, it's very much public that Lalu fears an unfair trial by the Patna High Court in the DA case (not dearness allowance but disproportionate assets). So, he wants to get two judges shifted. For onlookers, the very demand sounds absurd.

Who is a tainted Minister?

A tough question, because the more tainted one is, he seems to be a nicely painted one. That's why, it is said that tainting is more an art than at law. A few days ago, the PM was also so confused about the word that he said that we should define it first. There's the danger that a convenient definition of tainted may itself be criticised for being tainted.

One last question, will he quit?

"You can only milk a cow so long, then you're left holding the pail," said Hank Aaron. But in politics, nobody quits. Even the ones, who seem to be going off, come back through the back door. So don't breathe easy just because a corrupt politician is put in jail, because he may come out on bail without fail.

SayCheek@TheHindu.co.in

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