Dinner diplomacy — the new political flavour

A lot can happen over dinner and Union Minister of State and Gurugram MP Rao Inderjit Singh and his daughter, Health Minister Arti Singh Rao, seem to know this well. After a house-warming party by Arti in her father’s presence got a political spin last month, the father-daughter duo seems to have changed the narrative by the “balancing act” of hosting CM Nayab Singh Saini and his wife over dinner last evening. But this is not where it ends.

Sources close to the Raos maintain that “dinner diplomacy” is here to stay, and this is a part of “reconnecting” with the state capital and its administration. In a string of dinners to be organised over the next few months, the Union minister will play host to officers, too.

“Rao Inderjit Singh has been away from the state capital’s politics for long. As a Union minister and MP, Delhi kept him occupied for the last over two decades. Since an opportunity has presented itself now, and his daughter is a minister in the Saini Cabinet, he wants to renew ties which were on the back-burner. These dinners have no political overtones or undertones. These are only his way of re-establishing ties and getting into the groove of how things work in the state,” said an aide of the minister.

While the duo has denied that the house-warming party was a “show of strength”, the Raos have backed it by hosting the CM, putting all speculation to rest, for the time being.

However, with a sizeable number of MLAs in his kitty from the Ahir belt in Haryana, Rao Inderjit Singh has sway in his region, and has been, in the past, projected as the CM face by his supporters and MLAs owing allegiance to him.

In March, his loyalist MLA OP Yadav expressed disappointment over the government’s decision to drop the proposal for a Martyrs’ Memorial at Nasibpur, Narnaul, during the Budget Session of the Vidhan Sabha. Yadav termed it an “insult” to the memory of those who laid down their lives in the 1857 Revolution, and it became an issue with all MLAs of southern Haryana unitedly handing over a memorandum to the government for reconsidering the decision.

At a thanksgiving rally organised by Rewari MLA Laxman Singh Yadav in June, Rao Inderjit Singh, in Saini's presence, raised concerns over the continued neglect of south Haryana in development. He emphasised that the region had played a pivotal role in helping the BJP form the government for a third consecutive term, and now it was the CM's responsibility to ensure equitable development.

Since these MLAs belong to the Rao camp, any “get-together” is immediately seen as a political message to the party top brass.

While speculation is rife that Rao has been flexing his muscles, the BJP state chief, Mohan Lal Badoli, does not read too much into it. “The BJP is one big family and its leaders keep meeting informally. There is nothing more to the get-togethers hosted by the Union minister,” he said.