New Delhi, Sep 6 - It seems Minister of State for External Affairs Shashi Tharoor's patience is wearing thin at the constant media attention to his twittering that has apparently drawn the notice of some sections of bureaucracy. In an exasperated tweet sent last week from Kerala, Tharoor tersely pointed out, 'I'm astonished at the finger-wagging dislike of transparency amongst some in our democracy.'

He pointed out that other countries had even official policy on using Twitter for governance. 'The UK even issues advice on more effective tweeting!' he said. Now, is that a hint to the government to pay more attention to this micro-blogging service that can value add information to users?

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Ah those fiction-writing days!

On Tharoor again, is it goodbye fiction, hello politics? He appears to be missing his happier days as a UN official when he could squeeze in some time in the evenings and weekends to write fiction and essays that earned him much acclaim.

Ever since he moved inside South Block as a minister of state in charge of Africa and the Middle East, Tharoor has been deluged with calls for meetings from just about everyone who had a chance to know him even casually.

There are calls from Stephanians, people from Kerala, his home state and of course there are official engagements, his aide revealed. He has become virtually a workaholic, packing in as many as 10-15 meetings a day on an average. On one day recently, he had 26 back-to-back meetings that could have drained a man of lesser energy. But not Tharoor.

Where is the time? says Tharoor wearily every time one asks him about his next novel. With no time for literary pursuits, Tharoor, the author of 'The Great Indian Novel' and 'From Midnight to the Millennium' does the next best thing: launch novels written by others!

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Kashmiri 'spanner' in the AIIMS works?

Having battled anxious moments and even burnt the midnight oil after the H1N1 virus scare in various parts of the country, Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad has just begun to breathe easy. But he is saddled with another problem.

Apparently he is hunting for a Kashmiri Officer on Special Duty (OSD) for the premier All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS). Insiders in the health ministry point out that Azad is keen to zero in on a local from Jammu and Kashmir so that people from his home state get unhindered access to the prestigious institute.

But doctors, including senior officials at AIIMS, are putting a spanner in the works as they want an in-house inmate to hold the post. Efforts are now on to resolve the issue amicably to prevent the return of turbulence that hit the institute during Azad's predecessor Anbumani Ramadoss' time. Ramadoss and then AIIMS director P. Venugopal had taken their battle over autonomy of the institute to court.

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Why was Kamal Nath removed?

Trade diplomats from some 40 countries were all praise for the manner in which Commerce Minister Anand Sharma chaired the two-day ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in the capital last week.

Yet, one question still lingered in their minds: Why was his predecessor at Udyog Bhavan and present Road Transport and Highways Minister Kamal Nath removed from the job?

Indian journalists sought to tell them the portfolio Kamal Nath currently holds is an important one in India and that is the reason why Prime Minister Manmohan Singh named him the minister in-charge. But few were convinced.

Kamal Nath had literally walked out of some previous WTO meetings, including the last one at the WTO headquarters in Geneva in July last year.