Mystery advertiser

Local newspapers in Chhattisgarh were flooded with expensive, full-page advertisements carrying photographs of Congress leaders killed in the recent Naxal ambush. Who placed the ads and paid for them? Amazingly, no one in the local party knows. All India Congress Committee Treasurer Motilal Vora confirms that they were not released by the party. He asked the state party chief Charandas Mahant to "probe" the sources that did not hesitate to spend lakhs of rupees behind the scenes. None of the local leaders can understand why the ad was issued in any case since the party had decided there was no scope to derive sympathy votes from the tragedy. Just to be on the safe side, Congress leaders are also scrutinising the text of the ad to discover whether it contained any derogatory remarks.