Ins and outs of subsidies

Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh was reeling off the names of backward districts that would benefit from the Centre's subsidised interest rate schemes for women's self-help groups when he was asked why Allahabad, home to so many of India's well-known leaders, figured in that list. The minister promptly shot back that the Centre had nothing to do with this list and it was the Uttar Pradesh government (headed by the Samajwadi Party) that had identified these districts. When someone half-jokingly asked why Amethi and Rae Bareli (the constituencies of Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi respectively) did not figure, Ramesh replied with a straight face "Saifai [SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's ancestral village] does not figure in it either!"