You would have barely forgotten a gentleman called Sudheendra Kulkarni. He played a crucial role in ensuring that Advani was sent packing and he also had a role to play in the Jinnah episode involving Advani. These days he is with Mamta Banerjee and works as her eyes and ears in the Railway Ministry. Even otherwise when does Mamta find time out of the Left and Bengal to focus on her ministry. So it is as if Mamta has written a new rule on “transfer and power’’ in the ministry and while Sudheendra in his official capacity may only hold sway over a committee in the Railway Ministry, but he recently even met the Prime Minister as a special emissary of Mamta, that too regarding the Railway Budget. It is interesting that while Sudheendra is enjoying the fruits of the UPA rule, he still enjoys equally good relations with both Advani and Venkaiah. He also has a strong bonding with proud Mumbaikar president of BJP Nitin Gadkari. Recently Kulkarni became the Mumbai chief of the Mukesh Ambani group run Observer Foundation. His friendship with Hinduja is as thick as his relationship with the Tatas. And with Tatas too his friendship fructified when the Singur was a burning topic and when Mamta was opposing both the Tatas and the
Singur project. But it was Kulkarni who despite all this managed to stay close to both Tatas and Mamta. This is called political jugglery.