DailyOh! Priyanka Gandhi closer to leaving Lutyens’, to how soap and glass shaped Delhi
The deadline to vacate the Lodhi Road bungalow ends on July 31.
The Rajasthan High Court on Tuesday told all camps in Rajasthan politics to wait till Friday for a verdict on whether Sachin Pilot and camp, with 18 MLAs, stand disqualified as MLAs or not. To avoid any confusion, the HC told Speaker CP Joshi to wait before initiating any action against the rebels. Joshi, on Wednesday, challenged High Court’s wait-till-Friday order in Supreme Court. Who likes to wait? Don’t ask latecomers that. They won’t have a whiff of it.
But awaited police action in Ghaziabad cost a journalist his life and people of Uttar Pradesh their trust in the law and order. Not that there was much any way. Vikram Joshi had complained to the police that men in his area were harassing his niece. The encounter-specialist UP Police waited to initiate action till reportedly the same men shot Joshi in his head in front of his two daughters. Yogi Adityanath has announced a compensation of Rs 10 lakh for Joshi’s family. Justice? That will have to wait for now.
But Twitter has been quick to act against 7,000 accounts it believed were propagating conspiracy theories. Twitter has permanently suspended the accounts of far right-wing conspiracy theory movement QAnon. What was the conspiracy they were propagating? QAnon propagates the idea that US President Donald Trump is fighting a group of elites in the US government who run a child trafficking ring. We thought Trump was fighting Corona and China, who spread Corona to the world.
Twitter has spelt trouble for Supreme Court advocate Prashant Bhushan too after he reportedly spelt out ‘contempt’ in two of his tweets. In one his tweets, Bhushan said the four previous Chief Justices of India each played a role in destroying democracy in India, in the last six years. The other tweet accused Chief Justice SA Bobde of riding a bike taken from a BJP leader without a helmet and face mask. It later turned out the bike didn’t belong to a BJP leader and Bobde wasn’t riding it, but only sitting on it.
CJI rides a 50 Lakh motorcycle belonging to a BJP leader at Raj Bhavan Nagpur, without a mask or helmet, at a time when he keeps the SC in Lockdown mode denying citizens their fundamental right to access Justice! pic.twitter.com/PwKOS22iMz
— Prashant Bhushan (@pbhushan1) June 29, 2020
Now, helmet isn’t mandatory while sitting on a bike, but mask is necessary at all times. So Bhushan could be partly right, partly wrong on Bobde. But who are we to judge the right and wrong in a matter before the courts? No one.
So forget Bobde on the bike because we spotted tennis superstar Rafael Nadal on a yacht. A luxury yacht at that too. It’s called – the 80.
Tennis superstar Rafael Nadal has been captured for the first time on board his newly delivered luxury motor yacht, the 80 @SunreefYachts Power ‘Great White’. #superyachts pic.twitter.com/QBn99wWmrF
— Boat International (@boatint) July 21, 2020
A Sunreef yacht can cost US $3 million, but the one Nadal has could have cost him US $6.2 million (Rs 46.4 crore).
If Nadal has millions for a yacht, Mukesh Ambani has billions more than everyone in the world but four. The Reliance Industries Limited chairman today became the world’s fifth-richest man after his fortune surged by $2.12 billion in a single day.
According to Forbes, Ambani's net worth is $75 (74.76) billion. If you have money, spend it like Nadal because shauk badi cheez hai. Also, costly cheez hai.
It is the shauk for grandeur that sees MPs, MLAs and other dignitaries, real or assumed, live in Lutyens' Delhi, legally and illegally. They can totally own yachts like Nadal but they prefer to own the bungalows in the heart of Delhi. Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi is in no mood to stretch her legal stay beyond its legal timeframe. She is looking out for a bungalow to move into, after she moves out of Lutyens’ Delhi before the time to do so ends. Many say, citing sources, she has figured out a nest in Gurugram. Many others say, citing sources again, she has found one in South Delhi.
You can’t talk about Lutyens’ Delhi without talking about Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens. Did you know the great architect relied on soap and glass for his drawings. Why? Because soap was cheap and easy to erase. On glass, it was easier still. Of course, he would have drawn and redrawn maps. Was he frugal or environment sensitive is for Lutyens to know.
What you need to know today is that in about a month from now, Naseeruddin Shah-starrer Mee Raqsam would release on Zee5. Shabana Azmi who is presenting the film has called the movie a homage to her father Kaifi Azmi. The movie has been directed by Shabana's brother Baba Azmi and is set to release on August 21.
But what has left many puzzled is what the title means. The first one to admit to having been left puzzled was late Rishi Kapoor. That was in January 2019.
All the very best for your film I am sure you will do a great job. Nice name,phonetically “Mee Raqsam”but don’t know the meaning. @babaazmi Good luck and go for it! Regards......
— Rishi Kapoor (@chintskap) January 17, 2019
People who were not puzzled are those who know Persian or Urdu. Raqsam, our Word Of The Day, is a Persian word. But Urdu has borrowed heavily from Persian so many Persian words are now used in Urdu like they always belonged to Urdu. Sounds like sugar mixing in water. But raqsam means neither sugar, nor water. It means dance drawing from the Persian word raqs, which means dance. That is why Raqassah is female dancer.
Mee Raqsam is I dance. Listen to this ghazal in Persian; you may not understand it all, but when has music needed a language that is understood by all to touch a chord?
The less said about the power of music to connect, the better, because of instead of saying you can use that time listening. That’s one old habit dying fast.
So sit down and listen to AR Rahman’s musical tribute to Sushant Singh Rajput. Well, you can move around and listen too. The choice is yours.
China says it had no choice in shutting down the Houston consulate because it was forced to do by the US. Soon after the decision to shut it down, no matter whose decision it was, visuals appeared showing fire in the consulate’s courtyard. What’s burning? Some say sensitive documents that China wouldn’t want US to get access to.
Let that be as that is. It is a matter between China and the US. We have our own issues to sort out with China.
The government will do what is to be done about that but to contain the Wuhan virus from spreading, you know what you got to do.
We aren’t saying because you know it.
Meet you tomorrow.