Devil in the detail

At a rally in Gaya (Bihar) earlier this week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi showered praise on chief ministers Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh) and Vasundhara Raje (Rajasthan), saying they had pulled their respective states out of stagnation. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj's name was conspicuous by its absence from the PM's Gaya poll speech. That otherwise innocuous detail fanned speculation that Swaraj had been hit the hardest by relentless Opposition attacks. Some, of course, came to her defence pointing out that the PM highlighted development of states in his speech. So he praised his chief ministers and showcased their achievements and that a central minister didn't really fit into the scheme of things.