below the line

It is quite common knowledge that whatever the Prime Minister wishes, it gets implemented in no time..

But if there is one thing that has still proved elusive when it came to implementation, it is the Prime Minister's desire of seeing four Indian accounting firms in the world’s Big 8 by 2022.

Four years after he made this wish known at an ICAI event on the occasion of Chartered Accountants Day (July 1) in 2017, not much headway has been made on this front, indicating that this goal is unlikely to be achieved by 2022.

So much so that the Prime Minister himself on Sunday (in his customary Mann ki Baat address) reminded the CA fraternity of this expected gift from CAs of the country.

Just what the doctor ordered, quipped a CA Institute observer, referring to the Prime Minister’s latest nudge.

Animal activist Maneka Gandhi found herself in trouble last week after she purportedly used abusive language against a veterinary surgeon in Agra.

In an audio clip that went viral, the former Union Minister, known for her short-temper, was heard berating the vet for not doing a surgery well, calling him names and threatening to get his licence cancelled.

Veterinarians across the country, however, felt that her behaviour was uncalled for and wanted her to apologise to the vet. To press this, the Indian Veterinary Association observed June 23 as a black day and attended to work wearing a black arm band.

Watch what you say or netizens will have a field day trolling you on social media. Tamil Nadu Electricity Minister Senthil Balaji learnt this hard truth after he blamed squirrels for frequent power cuts. He said squirrels running on overhead power lines caused frequent disruptions in service. His comment, “squirrels are the reason”, was trending the whole day with over 12,000 tweets on the topic.

In the past, former PWD Minister Sellur Raju’s bizarre idea of covering a reservoir in Madurai with thermocol sheets to prevent evaporation of water in drought-hit Tamil Nadu had got the nation going. He earned the moniker ‘thermocol’ minister and now Balaji is ‘squirrel’ minister.

A former cricketer known for his straight drives and honoured by the Government with one of the Padma awards is looking to hire a communication specialist. One might wonder why would he want a public relations person when he is a brand by himself. Reading further down, the job description gives us the reason. The ex-cricketer wants to build his personal brand around activities beyond sports which is intriguing, to say the least. Does it mean that he may want to dabble in politics? We will get to know soon about the trajectory his career will take once he hires a communication specialist.

For seven years, Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) founder and Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has largely confined himself to his Camp Office. He hardly visited the Secretariat in the first term and in the second term it was demolished to build a new one.

But KCR has changed his public outreach, almost overnight after his former Cabinet colleague Eatala Rajender quit the party and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Over the last few weeks, he visited Covid hospitals and three districts to inaugurate new government offices. And, for the first time, he met a delegation of the Opposition Congress party to take a representation from them that seeks a probe into the custodial death of a Dalit woman.

On Saturday, he convened an all-party meeting, again a first in seven years, to discuss a scheme targeting Dalits. One of the main allegations of Eatala was that the Chief Minister had never given appointments to Opposition MLAs and leaders. So, someone has begun to listen to grievances!

Our Bureaus

With regard to the news article on G-Secs published on June 26, the headline should read ‘RBI’s short-term paper devolves; 10-year G-Sec unsubscribed’, and not as published. The error is regretted.

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