Jai Tukaram (Mundhe) Chant At Mumbai Press Club!

Tukaram Mundhe, the man to respect these days, came, saw, and conquered a packed audience on the Terrace of the Mumbai Press Club at Azad Maidan on Wednesday (Aug 26) afternoon.  It was quite unusual of the Chairman of the Press Club, S Balakrishnan, to prod the Fourth Estate members to give a round of applause, which they are not trained for, to the Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration Commissioner. The chairman, who was sweating a quarter of an hour before the scheduled start of the interactive session because of the lack of head count, stoked Mundhe’s ego by saying that in the last few months he had crashed through the popularity chart of cinema superstars, including Amitabh Bachchan. The true-blue journalist clapped hard and long before Mundhe said he is not a celebrity and was only doing a job expected of him as the chief boss of FDA, Maharashtra. He proceeded to educate the curious journalists on the nitty-gritty of the FDA Commissioner’s duties, which have been discussed at national conferences for FDA departments across the country, and that violations in Maharashtra in particular dominated the chatter a couple of years ago. Mundhe, who was asked over one hundred questions, said reading is his hobby and that he would like to go trekking in the Himalayas, time permitting. Mundhe 51, cleared the IAS in 2005 and has been tossed about across the State like a yo-yo over 20 times. He doesn’t discriminate between the haves — the rich and the mighty and have-nots! He was game to field all questions, although he was initially told that his first visit to the watering hole of journalists in Mumbai was only for a chit-chat sort of. The journalists were pleased as punch; a lady even described him as her hero!