Will Jitendra Singh replace Gehlot to become Rahul's most trusted advisor?

Is Bhanwar Jitendra Singh from Alwar going to be the one to replace Ashok Gehlot as Congress President Rahul Gandhi's most trusted advisor? To be sure, Singh lacks Gehlot's experience and connect with the masses. But he was among the most influential leaders of the party in convincing Sachin Pilot that he should make way for Gehlot as Chief Minister and serve as his deputy. Singh has worked with Gandhi earlier as his secretary when the latter was a general secretary in charge of the youth wings. Gandhi has his own compulsions. Having promoted the old guard in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, he needs to send a signal to the younger people in the party that the top posts won't always be the monopoly of the old and experienced.

 
Same difference
 
The Winter session of Parliament ends on Tuesday. The big question, however, is whether the government would hold a separate Budget session to present its interim Budget or extend the Winter session. According to sources in the government, the session would begin on January 30, and would last for a week. It would involve presentation of the interim Budget. The Economic Survey will not be presented. But there are two views within the government on whether it should prorogue the ongoing Winter session, and call a separate Budget session, or treat the break between January 8 and 30 as recess and count the last few sittings of the current Lok Sabha as an extension of the Winter session. In 2009 and 2014, the UPA governments had combined the Winter and Budget sessions.

 

Last minute change
 
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) planned to organise a press conference in Parliament on Thursday. Most political parties, including the CPI (M), hold routine press conferences, if not every day, then once in two days, inside Parliament when it is in session. The CPI (M) press conference was likely to focus on the violence related to the Sabarimala issue allegedly perpetrated by the Sangh Parivar. Usually, the CPI (M) press conferences are addressed by the party's leaders in the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. In the Lok Sabha, the party's leader is Mohammed Salim, and Elamaram Kareem is its leader in the Rajya Sabha. However, since the issue related to Sabarimala, the party thought it wiser that one of its Hindu member of Parliament from Kerala should address the press conferences, and the CPI (M)'s Lok Sabha MP from Palakkad, M B Rajesh, was roped in at the last minute.