The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Humps as hoardings

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Humps as hoardings

This is the age of hard sell. From huge hoardings to eye-catchy advertisements in print and electronic media, promotional campaigns are everywhere. Nothing gets noticed sans these props.

In the mad scramble to catch and retain the consumers' attention, how does one come up with a different idea, that too without spending a fortune? The ingenuity of a private school management stood out.

It chose camels to spread the word. The `desert ships' draped in cloth banners, walk across languidly on the streets, instantly catching the attention of passers-by who stop a moment to take in the details of the school while the lensmen freeze the `novel advertising' in their cameras.

Well one should wait until the new academic year to check out how many pupils were drawn to the school by the `camel' advertisement.

The city's first citizen was busier than a beehive these days. Putting his Mayoral responsibilities on the backburner, Teegala Krishna Reddy was active in the annual Mahanadu of the Telugu Desam Party.

At the sprawling Exhibition Grounds, the programme venue, he was seen keeping an eye on the goings on and issuing instructions to the party cadre.

Dressed in a yellow shirt instead of his trademark white, Mr. Reddy flitted around the Exhibition Grounds, controlling the cadre and shouting orders on the walkie-talkie.

Of course he slipped into the new role with effortless ease. The handling of MCH corporators seems to come handy for the new job.

The words "State Guests" - "Sarkari Mehmaan" -- would instantly make one recall guests who are esteemed, judging from the usage of the term in the media. But at the ITC Kakatiya Sheraton and Towers, a delegate at the 6th conference of the South Asian Editors Forum used the words to hilarious effect.

The speaker started "Your Chief Minister called us State Guests and made us feel really special. But where I come from, we use those words with a different effect.

It means being in jail and I must admit that the jail here (meaning the ITC Kakatiya where they were lodged in) is really pleasant".

The speaker was none other than the senator, a minister in several cabinets, a prolific writer with 10 book titles to his credit, a photographer and an intellectual from Pakistan, Mr. Javed Jabbar. He had the audience in splits really with his short but sweet speech.

Mayor T. Krishna Reddy wore a different robe at the general body meeting of the Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad the other day. Usually he keeps calm, is strict about time limit for each question and makes visible effort to be impartial so much so that his Telugu Desam Party members used to grumble over being `ignored'.

When Chitra Ramachandran was the MCH Commissioner it was her show all the way. But this time with Sanjay Jaju hardly a few days into the job, the Mayor took over the proceedings.

He allowed discussions to linger on and even joined corporators in criticising officials. Yet, Mr. Reddy was also careful not to target Mr. Jaju.

He also warned corporators not to interfere in officials' works as it might get them a bad name.

"I have my powers," he said once and his party colleague, Shekar Reddy, replied: "Please use them, sir!" Still, at the end of the day TDP members felt they got the short shrift as corporators belonging to Majlis, Congress and BJP hogged all the limelight and time.

J.S. Ifthekhar,

Suresh Krishnamoorthy and V. Geetanath

M. L. Melly Maitreyi, J.S. Ifthekhar, Suresh Krishnamoorthy and V. Geetanath

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