Indian Presidential Elections-2012: Nominations Filed!

After extending a last-minute and much deliberated support to PA Sangma the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the main opposition political party of India, ensured that the 14^th Presidential Elections to indirectly elect the 13^th President of India was going to be a contest. Pranab Mukherjee, the former Finance Minister who was given a rousing farewell on 26^thJune, 2012, Vs PA Sangma, a political leader from North East India and the former speaker of the lower house of Parliament.

Both of the Presidential candidates filed their nomination papers today. Flanked by the Prime Minister, the Congress President, many other Congress leaders and prominent leaders belonging to the political parties in the ruling coalition, Pranab Mukherjee filed his nomination in the morning in New Delhi. Talking to reporters afterwards the stalwart Congress leader and also a consistent trouble shooter for the ruling coalition expressed his gratitude for the honor and thanked all political parties for extending support to him. He said he would start poll campaign after June 30 till 15^th of July.

After about two hours PA Sangma filed his nomination papers. He was flanked by the top BJP leaders, leaders of other supporting parties and prominent leaders from the North East. In his press briefing Sangma reiterated his commitment to over 100 million tribal population of the country and hoped for support from other parties.

Two ironical elements are involved in this Presidential Poll. The people of West Bengal would have rejoiced as a whole at the prospect of the first ever Bengali President, but for Mamata Bannerji…!

The people of the Meghalaya would have celebrated for the first ever Presidential candidate from this hilly state of North East India and in fact, the North East in totality would have been a happier lot at the prospect of having another President after the brief tenure of Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed(originally from Assam and President in 1974 till his death in 1977), if only Sangma’s candidature was properly carried forward. Sangma’s party, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), opposed him vehemently rather than proposing. Being forced to resign from the NCP Sangma asserted his ‘non-political’ identity while his coalition-Minister daughter and sons who were still active members of the same party started campaigning for him and are still doing so.

Anyway, the contest is on. Last date for nominations is June 30 after which campaigning starts. Polling date is July 19 and the results will be out on July 22. The electoral college consisting of the members of the Parliament and the state assemblies and members of other legislative councils has a strength of over 1 million votes. Pranab Mukherjee seems to be heading for a landslide victory with about 700,000 votes in his favor.

The citizens of Indian would hope the electoral process to steer clear of lobbying and dirty politicking in the coming days.

The VIP Brat: A Study in Contrast!

Here we’re talking about only two compartments inside a particular AC 2-Tier coach in a particular daily train under the Indian Railways that departs a particular originating station at around noontime and reaches the destination city early morning the next day. The train is popular because it is superfast and always on time. That fateful noon too, the train was ready for boarding about one hour before departure. We cut to the inside of that particular coach having those two compartments for our contrasting study. Two elderly couples were in a state of considerable distress. One of them, both technically senior citizens, had been allotted two upper berths and the husband was at his wits end how to proceed, because his wife was being taken for check-up after surgeries in both of her knees—she could hardly walk and her climbing up the berth was a sheer impossibility. The husband was also on the wrong side of the sixties, but he thought he could manage the climbing once he managed a ...

Mitali: The Trauma of Losing a Sibling

Maybe I lied to her when I used to reassure her that she was going to be alright and was going to resume her life in some measure of normalcy in the future years; maybe all my gestures/expressions were false when I used to run my fingers across her forehead or embrace her on occasions when she was able to move around a bit; and maybe all my exhibitions of love care and responsibility were exposed as superficial when I failed to turn up in Delhi where she along with my mother were treated during September-October, 2022 (my mother Urmila Chakravarty was also diagnosed with dental cancer the same month the same year as she was) and when all the members of my parental family and the in-laws converged. Since that fateful day in August, 2022 when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer to that disastrous day of March 6, 2025—the day my younger blood sister Mitali (Mainu) Chakravarty Sarma (November 2, 1963—March 6, 2025) passed away in the wee hours in a hospital in Guwahati after giving a bra...

Release of Book 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories'!

The fourth collection of stories titled 'Randomized: A Dozen Short Stories' by Chinmay Chakravarty has been released on Amazon KDP just now! This collection, short stories in a lighter vein plus with mild satire like the previous collections, has been published in both the E-book and Paperback formats. The links are given below: International: Click Here ! India: Click Here ! Other collections of short stories by the same author: The Cheerless Chauffeur and Other Tales(2021)--Notion Press. Funny and Fishy Tales(2022)--KDP. The Weirdos(2022)--Ukiyoto Publishing. All books of the author are available on Goodreads, apart from Amazon and other outlets! Have a look!