What some of our leaders were up to on the weekend.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath attended a key BJP meeting in New Delhi on Tuesday as party leaders discussed the ongoing campaign for the state assembly polls ahead of the announcement of its candidates for the initial phases in a few days.
The Supreme Court on Friday said a plea filed by Union minister Ajay Mishra's son Ashish Mishra seeking bail in a case related to Lakhimpur Kheri violence should be placed before a bench comprising judges who had earlier dealt with the matter.
The two-time CM, who had also been the Rajasthan Governor, died at a Lucknow hospital on Saturday after prolonged illness.
Uttar Pradesh chief minister-designate Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday met Bharatiya Janata Party president JP Nadda to discuss the formation of government in the state.
Congress MLA Narensh Saini and Samajwadi Party MLA Hari Om Yadav, both from Uttar Pradesh, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday, a day after the ruling party suffered a jolt with the resignation of state government minister Swami Prasad Maurya.
The BJP appointed Sunil Bansal, one of the party's key election managers, as its national general secretary and in charge of three opposition-ruled states -- West Bengal, Odisha and Telangana -- in run-up to the Lok Sabha polls in 2024.
A court in Lakhimpur Kheri on Tuesday framed charges against Ashish Mishra and 13 others in connection with the October 2021 violence in Lakhimpur Kheri's Tikunia in which four farmers were killed.
Invitees to the 'pran pratishtha' consecration ceremony at the Ram temple started arriving Sunday in Ayodhya -- once a sleepy town now resplendent with new infrastructure and gripped by heightened religious fervour on the eve of a seminal event in India's political and religious history.
Farmers were staging a protest in Tikunia village on October 3 last year against a visit of Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya when four of them were crushed under the wheels of a convoy of cars. In the subsequent violence, four others including two BJP workers and a journalist were killed.
Addressing an election meeting on what once was the home turf of slain gangster-politician Atiq Ahmed, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday appeared to invoke nature as a great leveller -- a force that delivers justice.
The bypolls were necessitated after Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya vacated their seats following their election to the Uttar Pradesh legislative council.
IG Singh, however, said that there was no time limit in the summons sent to Ashish Mishra.
Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel and Punjab Deputy CM Sukhjinder S Randhawa had announced that they would visit Lakhimpur on Monday.
Reacting to the development, Samajwadi Party leader Sanjay Lathar, who served as the Leader of Opposition in the legislative council before Yadav, said the leader of the second-largest party in the House gets the post.
"How can the judge go into postmortem report etc. We are hearing a bail matter, we do not want to prolong.This way of going into merits and going into wounds etc. is unnecessary for the question of bail," the bench observed.
His remarks promoted an instant rebuttal from BJP leader and Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya who termed the statement an "insult to the doctors and scientists of the country".
The Supreme Court is scheduled to pronounce on Wednesday its order on the bail plea of Union Minister Ajay Kumar Mishra's son Ashish Mishra, an accused in the 2021 Lakhimpur Kheri violence case.
Kaif's tweet received nearly 5k likes and prompted responses lilke 'The beauty of India', 'This is the India of our dreams', 'We the people of India... Jai Hind.'
"The killing of two BJP workers in Lakhimpur Kheri after a convoy of cars mowed down four farmers is a reaction to an action. I do not consider those involved in the killings as culprits," Tikait said in reply to a question asked during a press conference in New Delhi.
'The people of Uttar Pradesh have already made up their mind to puncture the Samajwadi Party's cycle, kick away the Bahujan Samaj Party's elephant, and remove shadows of the already-vanished hand of the Congress.'
Officials said most of the preparations are complete and the counting will start at 8 am on Saturday.
Jail Superintendent P P Singh said Ashish will be kept in a separate barrack in the jail due to security reasons.
In a message for the Congress, poll strategist Prashant Kishor on Friday said those looking for a quick revival of the grand old party-led opposition following the Lakhimpur Kheri incident are in for a big disappointment as there are no quick fix solutions to the "deep-rooted problems" of the party.
Bhartiya Kisan Union national president Naresh Tikait has asked BJP workers not to visit the rural areas of Uttar Pradesh, saying farmers are angry over the violence that broke out in Lakhimpur Kheri on Sunday.
A total of 15 crore people are benefiting from the programme in the state, Adityanath said.
Yogi Adityanath took the oath as Uttar Pradesh chief minister at the auspicious time of 1600, Friday, March 25, 2022, at the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana cricket stadium in Lucknow.
BJP president JP Nadda, Home Minister Amit Shah and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh were among those who attended the meeting.
The monk-turned politician will take the reins of the most populous state for a second time in a row after completing his full five-year term.
The Lucknow bench of the Allahabad high court had on July 26 rejected the bail plea of Mishra.
Glimpses from all the action from the campaign trail.
A bench headed by Chief Justice NV Ramana is likely to pronounce its verdict at 10:30 am on Monday.
Union Minister Ajay Mishra's son Ashish Mishra along with others accused in the case were also sent into judicial custody from police custody on Monday, the officials said.
The duo has been victorious multiple times from Sultanpur and Pilibhit. In the recent rejig of the BJP national executive committee, the two were also dropped from that list.
The BJP finalised its candidates for 172 assembly seats in UP and is likely to field both Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya who are currently MLCs.
The chief ministers of the two Congress-ruled states, along with party leader Rahul Gandhi, have arrived in Lucknow, from where they intend to go to Lakhimpur Kheri to meet the families of the victims.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha, an umbrella body of farmer unions, will be holding a mahapanchayat in Lucknow on Monday in a show of strength days after the Prime Minister's announcement of repealing the three farm laws.
Yogi and other ministers performed yoga to celebrate the eighth edition of the International Day of Yoga, June 21, 2022.
The byelections are scheduled to be held on March 11.
'The CM wants to develop a Film City that would provide the entire value chain of film-making services and infrastructure in one place.'