potholes propel patil back into limelight rural development minister jayant patils unexpected jump into the urban affairs of mumbai has caught veteran babus and senior cabinet members by surprise for well over a decade he was the blueeyed boy of the media as the states finance minister patil had set a record of presenting the state budget for nine consecutive years after the worst ever terror attack on the metropolis he was shifted to the home department in place of r r patil post the 2009 assembly polls while r r patil was entrusted the home portfolio jayant patil took over the reins of the rural development department since then he has been in the wilderness his presence in the government or the ncp rarely felt in fact not only his party colleagues but even his close aides in the government had written him offa week ago jayant patil suddenly realised that roads particularly in the island city were in bad shape in his capacity as guardian minister of mumbai jayant patil almost dumped bmc babus in his personal car and took them on a potholed ride of course it took a decade for jayant patil to know that roads in villages are better than mumbai despite the fact that he has been using the same road from his official residence behind jaslok hospital to mantralaya for the last 10 years after his caustic remarks the entire road has been surfaced incidentally bmc commissioner swadhin kshatriya too travels by the same road since both are neighbourssms spoilers ruin home ministers secretafter a prolonged delay of well over two months home minister r r patil finally succeeded in obtaining a green signal from chief minister ashok chavan for shifting 40odd ips officers in the rank of inspector general and additional director general under the law on transfers which provides that all eligible employees should be shifted before may 31 patil submitted a comprehensive list of ips officers to chavan in fact to ensure that the entire operation was secret patil personally took the file to chavan at least on three to four occasions with the hope that the cm will sign the file blindly on all occasions it was bad luck for patil since he was unable to interact with chavan on a onetoone basis ultimately patil did succeed in chasing chavan who recommended certain changes in the list by the time patil was in the process of finalising the list it was over in the entire state via sms for patil it was the biggest ever shock since he was confident that till the file was signed by chavan it will be secret a day later patil abandoned the entire exercise and instead began a highlevel probe to find out the source of the sms so far the home department is cluelesscm proposes tribunal disposesfor embattled chief minister ashok chavan it was the biggest ever embarrassment when a transfer order passed by him was set aside by a