INDIA SUMMARIZED

If one wondered why nobody so far has raised the Sonia-Italy angle in the Kerala incident in which two local fishermen were killed by gunfire from an Italian ship, the master of political grandstanding in the state, VS Achuthanandan didn’t disappoint. On Feb 20 he said he suspected that the arrest of the mariners was mere drama and there could be a ploy to rescue the arrested Italian mariners just the way Quattrochi was rescued. The “Q” word was as good as the “S” word and the opposition leader has fired the first salvo. Achuthanandan appeared quite serious when he made the comments. Did he really mean it or was it just a cheap shot at the Congress in view of a local Assembly bye-election (Piravom) that is crucial for the ruling UDF government? If he is persistent with his conspiracy theory, which he usually is, others are likely to follow. He is a clever politician who is often among the first to capture popular imagination. Conspiracy theories sell well in Kerala. The ...