Didi Darling, I Understand

Didi Darling, I Understand

Some days ago, we were treated to great hopes that a certain saffron party might be lapping up votes in the North East of the country but Didi declared through her noble spokesperson that she didn’t really care. The C.M. OF Bengal wasn’t bothered. Not a bit. Not a mite. Scared? Who she? Didi and her goons---er, sorry, I mean team were aiming for Lal Quila, that is Delhi, that is the Prime Minister’s slot. Wow! We were impressed. We puffed and preened. We wagged our tails. 

Ipsita Roy Chakraverti

Then Did set sail for Delhi to round up the would-be army of allies, the poor foot soldiers who would love to be on the winning side but didn’t have a leader to blaze the way. Didi, huffing and puffing, raised the flag of a prospective front which would overcome and squash the present government at the Centre. We all held our breaths. Was Didi doing all this to divert our attention from the anti-incumbency turmoil that her own state government in Bengal is facing?

 Be that as it may there was more hi-jinks to come. Didi in Delhi, holed up with family, that is Abhishek at South Avenue and called the would-be ministers and netas to come and see her. She proposed to talk about how they could best oust the nasties at the Centre. First, if I am not mistaken, came poor Arvind Kejriwal, with a colleague. I think it’s so cute that Arvind and Mamata are called ‘ Babli and Bunty’ . Anyhow, Didi welcomed them and before launching forth into a flurry of plans for the future she insisted they have fried, vegetable pakodas! Each one eight pakodas. No more. No less. The magic number? Had her tantric in Kolkata told her that each participant would be under her spell if she could stuff these down their gullets? But wait. Bunty was wise. He refused. Excused himself by saying that he had a health issue which prevented him from partaking of such food. He told his sweating colleague to do the honours. Poor chap. Didi was disappointed but something is better than nothing. The AAP chap had to gobble the pakodas down.
When Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad heard of the goings on at Abhishek’s he hastily said that all ‘charcha’ would be over ‘chai’---not pakodas.

Meanwhile, Didi met a few more disgruntled politicians who had not received much from the present regime. The motley crowd planning to take over Lal Quila was not quite what she had expected but she kept her chin up. Brave Didi. Now, she wanted to meet the Congress glamour girl Sonia who had made it a point to keep away from her. So had Rahul. But Didi was determined. She fixed up a sort of short meet with Sonia and that is all we know of Didi’s famous march to Delhi to rouse and raise a third front.

Net result? Now we hear the most fantastic and hilarious new that after Didi’s onslaught Chandrababu Naidu is doing a round of prospective allies, Sonia Gandhi says she is willing to be PM and even our poor, old, well into years former President, Pranab Mukherjee, is shuffling through the Constitution wondering if a former President can become a future Prime Minister.
What has Didi done?! And all the while she had been trying to make it quite, quite clear that she was The One. Why are people so dense?