Rajya Sabha-Lok Sabha TV merger: Which of the two will lose its identity?

Rajya Sabha TV (RSTV) and Lok Sabha TV (LSTV) will be merged soon. The point of interest is which of the two will lose its identity. By any reckoning RSTV has a far greater brand value but LSTV has the financial and administrative muscle. For viewers, it is the redrawing of the landscape of India’s public service broadcast but for those inside, it is about whose team retains the whip and, more importantly, whether the vice-president or the speaker nominates the chief executive officer from now.
 
A birthday to forget
It was a birthday he would surely like to forget. Wildlife activist Ajay Dubey shot off a complaint to district forest officer of Bhopal after Pradesh Congress Committee office bearers released some caged birds on the occasion of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath’s birthday. While most party workers greeted the Congress stalwart, there was no birthday message from former party president Rahul Gandhi or his sister Priyanka Gandhi. Earlier in the day, an advertisement published in local dailies to greet Nath spoke of things like “Nath’s loss in the 1996 polls” and how in 1993 his name was on the list of contenders for the chief minister’s post but he lost the race to Digvijaya Singh, whose name Arjun Singh had recommended. The Congress washed its hands of the matter, saying the party had not authorised the advertisement.

 
Corruption fodder

After Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya shot off a letter to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, alleging corruption in the Lucknow Development Authority (LDA), two legislators of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have voiced similar concerns. In separate social media posts, Shyam Prakash and Baburam Paswan observed that bureaucrats and officials “have continued” their sharp practices. They claimed even ruling party workers and leaders were at the receiving end of the high-handedness of officials. Although the two leaders have offered reasons for their outburst, the controversy has given fresh fodder to the Opposition to attack the government.