The corridors of power

Hello and welcome to Red Tape

We will bring you an inside account from the corridors of powers on what drives decision making, who greases the wheels of change or puts roadblocks on the path of decision making.

More importantly, we bring you interesting tidbits on decision makers, the hangers on, friends, foes, lobbyists, chamchas and godmen with all their virtues, idiosyncrasies and foibles.

Lets start by welcoming D.Subba Rao, the new Secretary Economic Affairs. Rao is a great believer in vaastu. So naturally, he is redoing his room at the North Block -- the same room which was once occupied by Dr.Montek Singh Ahluwalia. Next door to him is Revenue Secretary P.V.Bhide, an Andhra cadre IAS officer who is also apparently keen to rearrange his office according to the rules of vaastu. Will this trend stop with him or will the Finance Minister also follow suit in the hope of boosting his popularity with 10 Janpath? Or will the vaastu by two cross out the vaastu by one?

Another believer in vaastu is M.Damodaran, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India. The market regulator had redone his office at Mittal Court B -Wing in Mumbai by rearranging his table to face the opposite direction from his four predecessors - G.V.Ramakrishna, S.S.Nadkarni, D.R.Mehta and G.N.Bajpai. The vaastu clearly worked during his first two years at SEBI, but things have begun to get rather hot for the regulator after moving into the imposing SEBI Bhavan at the post Bandra-Kurla business district. Has the smart building dimmed the power of vaastu at the new office?