He is very presentable to print and electronic media, and articulate too. Ask any question and the answer is ready. Never mind if it doesn't gel with the party line. Meet flamboyant Congress spokesman Kapil Sibal, a legal luminary in his own right.

He is often required to justify the unjustifiable. Be it sugar import "scandal", Kargil, corruption in PMO et al. Who better than a legal brain like Sibal. But the spokesman put his foot in his mouth the other day when he stated, in response to a query, that there was no question of the Congress party heading a coalition government. The party, he seemed to suggest, would like to form its own government with others supporting from outside.

Hardly had he finished his briefing when CWC member and senior party leader AK Antony said the Congress party was not averse to heading a coalition government. Many thought Sibal had not done his home work properly. But Sibal must be given the benefit of doubt strayed as he has intopolitics rather late, after all.

His plainspeak on star TV programme early this week drew a flak among journalists when he made a common cause with Arun Shourie to chide journalists for not doing their home work properly. The issue on debate was whether mediapersons should lap up all that is given by partyspokesperson or do some research work before publishing the stuff as doled out.

By all accounts, mediapersons covering the Congress party are willing to let go the derisive comment by both. Perhaps they are only too acutely aware of the fact that Sibal and Shourie were not wrong in making the comment!

--Devsagar Singh