All The PM's men

And you thought there would be new faces running the Prime Minister's Office in UPA Mark 2? Disabuse yourself. It looks like the PM's men, otherwise known as the ``Mallu'' lobby, aren't going anywhere. Both his main lieutenants, principal secretary TKA Nair and national security advisor MK Narayanan, have settled back comfortably and if anything, become more powerful than they were in Manmohan Singh's last term.

With Pranab Mukherjee being replaced by a lightweight novice in the external affairs ministry (S M Krishna) and a fellow Malayali as minister of state (Shashi Tharoor), Narayanan has reclaimed foreign policy as his exclusive domain. Notice his sudden visibility after lying low for many months following the Mumbai terror attacks last November.

In the past one month, he has given television interviews, newspaper interviews and made public pronouncements on a range of diplomatic issues including the recent controversy over Chinese incursions into India. Nair is more low profile and prefers to work quietly behind the scenes. But he is no less powerful. He controls the levers of the government through another fellow Malayali, cabinet secretary K M Chandrasekhar.

Between them, they have set up the unusual system of nominating Nair to all important committees of secretaries, which is one of the key decision making instruments of government. He is also the PM's pointsman for the row between the Ambani brothers. Contrary to public perception, Nair, not the PM, is the one the warring siblings meet when they go to the PMO. So does Amar Singh. Congress circles had predicted that both Narayanan and Nair would be shifted out of the PMO to make way for 10 Janpath favourites in the new dispensation. They're eating their words now. Mallu lobby, zindabad!

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The rebirth of the Mallu lobby in the PMO is a blow to the ambitions of former Indian ambassador to Washington and one of the main architects of the Indo-US nuclear deal, Ronnen Sen. Believed to be a 10 Janpath loyalist, Sen returned to India hoping to find a slot in the PMO. If the Congress grapevine is to be believed, the PM requested him to remain in Delhi on the assurance that his services would be suitably utilised.

Accordingly, Sen cancelled his retirement plans and moved into an apartment in the Indian Foreign Service Officers' colony across the Yamuna river. But with the PMO putting up a ``houseful'' sign, Sen is at a loose end. He spends his days in the Delhi Gymkhana Club, reading, swimming and meeting old friends. It's called cooling his heels.

The other new face that was widely expected to grace the PMO was that of recently-retired foreign secretary Shankar Menon. His appointment is up in the air too and he has taken off for a longish holiday abroad. All eyes are on Manmohan Singh. Will he buck the domination of the Mallu lobby? Or is he content to let things remain the way they are?

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Tailpiece
An increasingly assertive PMO has decisively clipped telecom minister A Raja's wings. Not only does a group of ministers headed by Pranab Mukherjee take all major decisions of the ministry, Raja is finding it difficult to get a secretary of his choice to succeed the incumbent, Siddharth Behura, who retires at the end of September. Telecom giants are lobbying hard for officers of their choice. But poor Raja is not getting a look-in. He will just have to swallow the PMO's choice.