April 28 will be an interesting day in Karnataka politics. Congress chief Sonia Gandhi will pay a visit to the state to take stock of the drought situation and pep up the feuding party cadres. She will also visit the Siddaganga Mutt in Tumkur that is considered to be the abode of the dominant Lingayat community in the state. Gandhi will take part in a programme to wish Sivakumar Swamy, the seer of the mutt, on his 105th birthday.
Vicky Nanjappa reports on the changing mindset of the dominant Lingayat community in Karnataka with regard to who their new chief minister should be.
The detention comes a day after the charge sheet was filed against Kanchi Shankaracharya Jayendra Saraswati and the junior seer in the case.
Union Minister and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader M K Alagiri is reported to be upset over party supremo and former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi naming his younger son M K Stalin as his political successor.
Seeking to set at rest speculation on his future political moves, former Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa has decided to stay away from the coming 105th birthday celebration of Siddaganga mutt seer Shivakumara Swamiji in which Congress chief Sonia Gandhi is to take part in it.
Samajwadi Party MP R K Chaudhary's demand to replace the Sengol installed next to the Lok Sabha Speaker's chair with a copy of the Constitution triggered a war of words on Thursday, with opposition leaders backing him, and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party castigating him for 'disrespecting' Indian and Tamil culture.
The ruling BJP in Karnataka, where Assembly elections are due in April-May next year, considers Lingayats as its key vote-base.
The head of a religious mutt in Varanasi has slammed Bharatiya Janata Party and its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi for using the temple town to further their political ambitions.
The Save Sharda Committee (SSC) in Bengaluru on Friday sought the help of the Indian government to remove the 'encroachment by the Pakistan Army' on the Sharda temple premises in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK), in order to pave way for its restoration.
Central crime branch (CCB) police personnel from Bengaluru have arrested Hindutva activist Chaitra Kundapura and six others on the charge of cheating a businessman of crores of rupees after promising a BJP ticket for him from Byndoor assembly constituency in Udupi district.
A day ahead of the consecration ceremony at the Ram temple, the streets and the skyline of Ayodhya have turned saffron with flags flying atop buildings, small and big, across the temple town.
At a time when the BJP's stars are at the top on the eve of the Lok Sabha polls, the Puri-Joshimath Sankaracharyas may have kick-started a row whose efforts might be to divide Hindus, not in the name of castes, but on what passes for greater belief, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The plea said there is a deliberate attempt to ensure that the proceedings before this court become infructuous and a person who is not qualified and is ineligible, unauthorisedly assumes the office.
Amidst the controversy over the Gyanvapi Mosque complex in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has said that labelling Gyanvapi as a mosque complex will only lead to controversy and that the Muslim side should accept its 'historical mistake' and offer a solution.
'At a program held in Udupi Sri Krishna Matha two days ago, I spoke on the subject of 'Hindu Revival in Bharat'. Certain statements from my speech have regrettably created an avoidable controversy. I therefore unconditionally withdraw the statements,' Surya tweeted on Monday morning.
After he was set free, the seer was staying at the Virakta Math in Davangere, from where he was arrested by the Chitradurga police on on Monday.
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Stalin's personal intervention in the Adheenam row may have contained the avoidable political damage and social tensions at least for now, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
"Is it any surprise that the new Parliament is being consecrated with typically false narratives from WhatsApp University? The BJP-RSS distorians stand exposed yet again with maximum claims, minimum evidence," Congress general secretary communications Ramesh said in his tweet.
While Governor Ravi's speeches have put the local BJP supporters on the defensive in matters of religion and social justice, his add-on 'attack on the constitutional scheme' in the 'Senthil Balaji case', has been condemned squarely by many legal experts and editorial writers across the country, thus adding weight to CM Stalin's position -- at least until the courts come up with their binding views, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
So, he approached Rajiv Gandhi and the then president Venkataraman and was advised by both to accept it only if no other job was available.
'The Kanchi Mutt was energised by Pudu Periyava.' 'Instead of people coming to the Mutt, he has taken the Mutt to the people in several dimensions.'
The police found a couple of pages of a purported death note by the seer in which he is said to have blamed some people of "harassing and blackmailing" him.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, former chief minister B S Yediyurappa, IT industry veteran N R Narayana Murthy along with wife Sudha Murty, and Mysuru royal family member 'Rajamate' Pramoda Devi Wadiyar, were among the early voters who cast their ballot in the Karnataka Assembly polls.
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"The way the hijab imbroglio unfolded gives scope for the argument that some 'unseen hands' are at work to engineer social unrest and disharmony. Much is not necessary to specify," the three-judge bench headed by Chief Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi said in the order.
Swami, who headed the Sree Siddaganga Mutt, breathed his last at the age of 111 on Monday at 11.44 am.
Siddaramaiah's anti-urban bias, which he does not bother to hide, may become the Congress government's biggest weakness unless it is corrected.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin on Wednesday asserted that not even a "speck of dust" fell on state Governor R N Ravi during a black flag protest against him in Mayiladuthurai and said the opposition All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's attempts to "do politics" over the matter will not fructify "as this is DMK rule."
The 'Tamil Thai Vaazhthu', an invocation, is only a prayer song and not a National Anthem and hence, there is no need for every one to remain in standing posture when it is rendered, the Madras High Court bench here has ruled.
Sniping at the BJP senior leadership has reached a new high in Karnataka. For the moment, there is a truce, but the party knows the damage it could do ahead of the polls.
One of prominent religious leaders of South India, the 88-year old Swamiji was admitted to a hospital at Manipal a few days ago for breathing difficulty and his end came on Sunday morning, they said.
'Sengol', a historical sceptre from Tamil Nadu which was received by first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to represent transfer of power from the British and was kept in a museum in Allahabad, will be installed in the new Parliament building to be inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on May 28, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said Wednesday.
Controversy at the Pejawar Mutt -- an integral part of the VHP and the Ram temple movement -- forces PM to stay away.
The Uttar Pradesh Police had on Tuesday constituted an 18-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the death of the seer and detained a disciple of his in Haridwar.
The seer has been in custody since September 1 in a Protection of Children from Sexual Offences case.
Police said the 79-year old Kerala-based seer Kesavananda Bharati Sripadagalvaru died at the Edaneer Mutt in Kasaragod due to age related ailments. The case in which Bharati had challenged a Kerala Land Reform Act nearly four decades ago set the principle that the Supreme Court is the guardian of the basic structure of the Constitution and the verdict involved 13 judges the largest bench ever to sit in the apex court.
On Tuesday, the dharmasabha started on a heated note first over seating arrangements, and then on other issues, including taunts aimed at each other, they said.
In its charge sheet filed in a court in Allahabad in Uttar Pradesh, the CBI has charged Giri, priest of Allahabad's Bade Hanuman Temple Addhya Tiwari and his son Sandeep Tiwari with criminal conspiracy and abetment to suicide.
'The BJP's defining character is Hindutva. The party's political strategy is based on a combination of Hindutva+Development.'
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