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STATES: ORISSA
Man Of Letters
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's skill with the quill
has the PMO busy acknowledging his missives. And on occasion agreeing
to his demands.
By Ruben Banerjee
Throughout, his
diehard opponents have blamed Naveen Patnaik, Orissa's chief minister,
for the ills that plague the state. It's an attitude that the affable
Patnaik has learnt to live with. But even he was taken aback when last
week, Bijoy Mohapatra, president, Orissa Gana Parishad, accused him of
being responsible for the shortage of postage stamps in the state. What
could possibly have been the connection? If Mohapatra is to be believed,
the crisis occurred because the "chief minister is writing simply
too many letters".
Although it's doubtful whether Mohapatra seriously
meant what he said, his statement throws light on a serious issue. During
his 15-month tenure Patnaik has betrayed a propensity for dispatching,
at the slightest pretext, letters to the prime minister and several union
ministers on a variety of issues including a long-standing plea to declare
Orissa a special category state. He has, in fact, proved to be a skillful,
emotive and prolific writer who averages a letter every six days.
Not surprisingly, the regularity of Patnaik's
post office rendezvous is stoking varied emotional responses in the state.
"The letters prove how focused the chief minister is in extracting
an extra pound of flesh from the centre for Orissa's development,"
says Panchanan Kanungo, a ruling BJD legislator. But a far greater number
of people nurture diametrically opposite views. Mohapatra, for one, says,
"I suspect Patnaik is deaf and dumb. Why else would he prefer writing
letters over other effective means for getting Orissa a better deal?"
For some time now Patnaik has unwittingly borne
the tag of being one of the quietest and least troublesome of the NDA's
allies. Unlike N. Chandrababu Naidu of Andhra Pradesh for example, who
has been given to bouts of brinkmanship, Patnaik has, in the past few
months, proved to be the most dependable of allies making little or no
outward demands for his state. But burgeoning official files now show
that his rectitude may have found a different, more unusual avenue of
expression. "As a former socialite with impeccable etiquette, the
chief minister prefers to get things done in a civilised way," explains
a prominent Patnaik-aide. And Patnaik's way of trying to get things done,
as it now turns out, is to write letters aplenty to everyone who may be
in a position to help.
Two particularly bulky files in the secretariat
bear eloquent testimony to this. "Respected Shri Prime Ministerji,"
wrote Patnaik in a letter dated May 5, (vide UMI/2001/415-CM) requesting
Vajpayee's personal intervention in directing the Food Corporation of
India to procure more rice from Orissa and thereby save the state's farmers
from distress sale. Another letter dated May 11 (UMI/2001/427-CM), seeks
the prime minister's help in granting Orissa additional funds for drought
relief. Four days later, Patnaik was at his desk again, (UMI-1/2001/435-CM),
this time beseeching "Respected Prime Ministerji" to save Paradip
port from "near extinction" by withdrawing a certain central
notification. "The letters serve the great purpose of highlighting
Orissa's rightful aspirations," says Patnaik. More letters followed
and by the time May gave way to June, Patnaik had badgered the Prime Minister's
office (PMO) with six epistles. "No chief minister has ever knocked
on the doors of the PMO with requests and demands as Patnaik is now doing,"
says a senior bureaucrat.
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