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| Stree Shakti stripped by Rahul Gandhi and Modi,one after the other | | | Early Times Report
Jammu, Jan 31: Narendra Modi led NDA Government has been in the forefront of those parties that support women's rights and favour women empowerment.That Modi is for Stree Shakti was evident during the just concluded Republic Day celebrations where a senior woman officer commanded the guard of honour and women soldiers participated in the parade.
And it is a matter of irony that while people were feeling proud of Modi and the country for allowing a free hand to women to grow and rise to the pinnacle of their career two women had to bear the consequences of male chauvinism,one after the other.
First it was the Foreign Secretary,Sujatha Singh,who was slighted when,months before her completion of her term,India's US Ambassador,Jai Shankar was appointed as the new Foreign Secretary.And Sujatha Singh does not know the actual reason for her being sidelined and insulted. She believes so because her appointment as Foreign secretary had been made on the basis of merit.She says she has always given her work everything which had earned her the distinction of being a competent,dedicated and hard working civil servant. Sujatha Singh does not seem to have lost her grace. Despite being slighted she believes that the decision to remove her is the prerogative of the Prime Minister to choose the foreign secretary that he wants.
The decision to replace her has hurt her because she considers it has become a question of individuals - of this personality versus the other personality, about brilliance and about not having experience. I would challenge anybody to look at the record of the Ministry of External Affairs, over the past 18 months that "I have been Foreign Secretary, and to say that any part of our foreign relations have suffered or that any part of our strategic engagement with the rest of the world, and, more importantly with the neighbourhood, has not got the attention that was due to it because I was Foreign Secretary. I am satisfied that there is nothing more that I could have done or anybody else could have done."
The second case pertains to the former Environment minister Jayanathi Natarajan who quit the Congress and mounted a scathing attack on Rahul Gandhi, claiming that she followed his directions on green nod to projects but was "vilified, humiliated and sidelined" by central leadership.
A longtime Congress loyalist, Natarajan said she was ready to face probe into environmental clearance accorded by her during her stint as minister in the UPA government and has no plans to join any other political party after "such bitter experiences".
"I have only followed the party line and rule book on all environment issues. To protect the forest rights of people and the rights of tribals in cases like Vedanata. There was no wrong doing on her part.
Virtually opening a can of worms, she accused Rahul Gandhi's office of planting stories to sully her reputation after she had resignaed as Environment Minister on the direction of Sonia Gandhi.Specific inputs were received from the office of Rahul Gandhi based on the representation by NGOs raising environment concerns on certain large projects," she said suggesting that the Congress Vice-President had interfered in the decision making process.This has prompted the BJP led NDA Government to order a thorough probe by examining in detail all the files that the former Environment Minister had cleared.
Well the story of two powerful women and the way they have been slighted and sidelined may be of small consequences but they indicate the level of intolerance male political leaders have against women colleagues.Well if Jayanathi Natarajan has quit the Congress it may not have any direct impact on the nation but the way Sujatha Singh has been eased out of the Foreign Ministry office is a matter of worry.Worry in the sense that Modi led Government is wasting time on extraneous issues.
Modi led Government had neither the patience nor the nerve to wait for seven months when the tgwo-year term for Sujatha Singh was to end.This way Modi's interests in giving a new push to India's foreign relations and to its economy were being hijacked by such issues.And it is better Modi does arise and awake for halting ghar Vapsi, rebuilding of Ram temple and for keeping other contentious issues under the carpet. |
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