Maya memsahib

REGIONAL ROUNDUP

Mayawati is back in the saddle as the Uttar Pradesh chief minister, and the regional media gave prominent coverage to her new innings this past week.

A day after the extent of BSP's huge majority became known, Dainik Bhaskar carried a profile of the party leader. With a front page piece headlined "A changed Behenji," Bhaskar reported on how BSP MLAs were surprised at Mayawati's restrained behaviour post victory. She asked her MLAs to strive to become "ideal legislators". Justifying her decision to transfer scores of officials within hours of assuming charge, the paper quoted Mayawati on how transfers must not be looked upon as punishments. Her openness with the media also struck Bhaskar as surprising, since she has avoided interactive sessions in the past.

In its May 16 edition, Rajasthan Patrika reported on the special CBI court adjourning hearing in the Taj corridor case. The paper, in a front page report, quoted CBI officials on why proceedings had to be halted. Barely two days before the counting of votes, former chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav had forwarded the case file to Governor T V Rajeshwar, seeking his approval to let the CBI go ahead with prosecution proceedings against Mayawati, the paper said. Since the governor's nod had not come along, the case had been adjourned by the CBI special judge.

The other major story of the week that grabbed headlines in the Hindi press was the resignation of Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran. A day after the resignation, Punjab Kesari traced the events leading up to it. The paper carried a report, headlined "DMK forces Maran to quit," on its front page. It detailed how the succession battle in the DMK came to a head after attacks on the Madhurai office of Dinakaran, a newspaper run by the Marans. Bhaskar, in its May 15 edition, quoted Maran as saying that he would continue to be a DMK MP but would devote his time to running the Sun network.

Mayawati's victory and Maran's resignation were covered extensively in the Kannada press as well, with both issues receiving front page attention for three consecutive days. The BSP's win in the UP elections prompted leading Kannada dailies to dedicate an entire page to the results and Mayawati. Praja Vani covered the election results over three pages with special reports and analysis. The newspaper termed BSP's win a victory for democracy.

The Maran episode too received a lot of coverage in the newspapers. Leading dailies covered it assiduously, with photographs relating to the developments being splashed on front pages. Market leader Vijaya Karnataka dubbed the incident as unfortunate. "No doubt, Dayanidhi Maran is a political novice, but he is one of the very few young politicians showing a lot of promise. Unfortunately, he too fell victim to dynastic politics that plagues India. It is very clear that the DMK leadership did not want the Maran family to 'hijack' the party," the newspaper said in its editorial.

The attack on Tamil newspaper Dinakaran by supporters of Azhagiri was the lead on the front pages of leading Telugu dailies on May 10. Frontline dailies Eenadu, Andhra Jyothi and Vaartha splashed the news with two-column photographs of the engulfed office of Dinakaran's Mysore bureau, besides carrying on their inside pages, a chronicle of events including the rift between Azhagiri and Stalin. Dayanidhi Maran's resignation too featured on the front pages of the Telugu dailies as two-column stories.

On Saturday, the landslide victory of BSP leader Mayawati was the lead on the front pages of the Telugu press. With headlines that read 'Maya's hawa' and 'Triumphant Maya,' the newspapers dedicated almost half their front pages to the news that featured illustrations of an elephant-mounted Maya and a stock photo of Maya sporting a crown and a sword. Analytical pieces on what went wrong with the BJP and Congress were carried in the inside pages.

On the same day, Eenadu, in its editorial 'Maya's Magic,' took potshots at the politically immature Rahul Gandhi. "Rahul's false promises and his remarks crediting the Nehru-Gandhi family with India's independence and the Babri issue during his roadshows in Uttar Pradesh, turned out to be a self goal for Congress in the elections," the newspaper said editorially.