India Today for sure can topple Today’s Chanakya of Odisha?

By Suparno Satpathy*

A mature politician, former Union Steel Minister of India and the Chief Minister of Odisha for more than 15 consecutive years – all this cannot be  taken away from Shri Naveen Patnaik. However, a tweet from him on a survey conducted by ‘India Today’ magazine which somehow places Odisha up at 5th position from its earlier 16th position has again felled the said avowal.

Apparently this was a closely held secret survey, which they call ‘State of States’. Naveen Babu’s friends in Delhi are well aware of his closeness with the Puries, it is an open secret. However, ground information about this survey by ‘India Today, particularly pertaining to Odisha, seems to be a closed secret. I have tried finding out as to what sample was it which was used for this survey and if the Government of Odisha had been informed about the same. But it seems that no body and I mean no body relevant has any information on it. Possibly it is only our Hon’ble CM who can give us some idea about the same but that is over stretching my expectations from him. He chooses to tweet snaps of skill development awardees without quoting their names & without letting us know as to what skill development was it for. He chooses to evade the Sishu Bhawan matter as if it never happened and off late his tweets  have been signaling as if there are no ‘farmer suicides’ in Odisha. the CBI, the Mining Scam, the Chit Fund scam etc have never made our CM give his opinion in public domain. Well, if I take into account the days of the past when our Hon’ble CM had not got onto micro blogging, I can go on & on, about the long list of grave happenings in Odisha, which he had chosen to elude. So possibly you can try and fetch a reply from him, I am certain that he will not reply to me.

In Odisha the Human Development Indicators show downgrade, job creations is in negative, the education system is in the pits, the health system is in doldrums, farmer after farmer have been committing suicide, ask any businessperson and their cry will deafen your ears, the police department is disgruntled from top-to-bottom, the IAS & OAS (barring very few) are grumpy as in how, the Government of Odisha has  long been begging for a special status from the Center, the Government  records  show that the quantum of  poor in Odisha has increased. This down facing list is very long to be accommodated in this write up. Then how is it that ‘India Today’ has given a new placing to Odisha from 16th to 5th position ?

After the 2015 Bihar election results ‘Babuji’ jokes have been replaced with ‘Today’s Chanakya ‘ jokes and after this secret survey which has made the Hon’ble CM of Odisha go gung-ho over it, ‘India Today’ for sure can topple ‘Today’s Chanakya’.

(Picture Courtesy: www.firstpost.com)

*The author Shri. Suparno Satpathy is a noted socio-political leader and the Chairman of SNSMT.