OF FAITH AND LOVETelangana’s current and former chief minister may disagree on virtually everything, but Revanth Reddy and K. Chandrasekhar Rao share a faith in the power of yagnas to keep the state prosperous. During his two terms, KCR staged elaborate, days-long Vedic rituals seeking divine assistance. Earlier this month, Revanth, accompanied by wife Geetha, performed a Maha Varuna Yagam, organised by the Congress government to pray for abundant rainfall during an El Nio year. Conducted at the depleted Nagarjuna Sagar reservoir, the ritual featured homams by 108 ritviks (priests). The venue also had sweeter memories for the couple; sources say the CM and his wife first met there over three decades ago and fell in love. The couple also posed for pictures, briefly mixing prayers for rain with a little nostalgia.SMALL CHANGE | SP AUDITS EX-ALLY Akhilesh Yadav appears to have reopened old political wounds with a rather colourful assessment of his former ally, Union minister Jayant Chaudhary. Taking an apparent dig at the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) chief, the Samajwadi Party president said, “Hum logon ne chavanni ka rupaiya bana diya, phir bhi hamein chhod kar chale gaye”, implying they had multiplied his political fortunes, but even then he left them. The RLD, which won just one seat in the 2017 UP assembly polls on its own, had got eight in 2022 after joining hands with the SP. Jayant and his men, though, moved to the BJP-led NDA ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha election and won both the seats the party contested. Akhilesh’s remark now has got the RLD all worked up, which felt it was an insult to the memory of Chaudhary Charan Singh, the late former prime minister and Jayant’s grandfather (who himself was no stranger to political intrigue) and the party’s core base, the farming community of western UP.AMERICAN DREAM Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel has been marking some unusual political milestones of late. Earlier this month, he reached the US to promote the upcoming Vibrant Gujarat Investors Summit, the first sitting CM from the state to do so in over three decades (Keshubhai Patel was the last, in 1995). Washington had denied a visa in 2005 to then CM, Narendra Modi. Bhupendra also completes five years on the trot as CM next month, only the fifth person to do so in 66 years of Gujarat’s history, after Congress’s Hitendra Desai and Madhavsinh Solanki and BJP’s Modi and Vijay Rupani.SELF-GOAL The official X handle of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has been on a fault-finding mission of late. On I-Day, it pounced on Bihar industry minister Shreyasi Singh for mistakenly calling Mahatma Gandhi “Rashtrapati” instead of “Rashtrapita” and also posted a video of health minister Nishant Kumar saluting in the direction of the camera after unfurling the tricolour. But then, on August 17, fate returned the favour. At a party meeting to remember ‘Mountain Man’ Dashrath Manjhi, RJD chief Tejashwi Yadav accidentally referred to him as Jitan Ram Manjhi, the NDA ally and Union minister. Predictably, there was no party post to highlight his slip of the tongue.DISSECTING A DEFEAT After the BJP’s Datia bypoll defeat in Madhya Pradesh, the blame game is on. The first round saw the district BJP unit being dissolved; now party leaders are pressing for police SP Mayur Khandelwal’s transfer for not “delivering” the seat. Posted only in May, sources say Khandelwal may become a scapegoat in the Narottam Mishra-CM Mohan Yadav tussle. Yet it may also save him. During the campaign, the ex-home minister had warned that he had a long memory for who was friend and foe, after the SP acted against his supporters for blocking a highway. Transferring Khandelwal now would vindicate Mishra’s ire, the last thing the CM would want.—with Prasad Nichenametla, Avaneesh Mishra, Jumana Shah, Amitabh Srivastava and Rahul Noronha- EndsPublished By: Mansi Published On: Aug 21, 2026 16:53 IST
