The Congress on Thursday virtually ruled out any grand alliance in poll bound Uttar Pradesh including with Samajwadi Party insisting that Rahul Gandhi wanted to set things right in the state which is in bad shape for past 27 years in non-Congress rule.
Left parties in Tamil Nadu on Tuesday made it clear that they were no more allies of the AIADMK and their joining hands for Lok Sabha elections was just a poll-time arrangement.
Accusing the government of 'violating Parliamentary propriety', BJP leader Sushma Swaraj said the move to hike petrol and diesel prices "raises suspicion as to which companies will be benefited by this decision." "The government has been saying that the public sector oil companies have been making profits and giving dividends to it. Then why this secrecy," she asked. Swaraj attacked the Congress for 'betraying' the common people.
The CPI(M), which has finalized 80 Lok Sabha seats, is in talks with other like-minded parties to forge electoral alliances on some more constituencies in its bid to forge an alternative against Congress and BJP.
Former Prime Minister V P Singh, who formed the first non-Congress coalition government at the Centre dethroning Rajiv Gandhi-led Congress in the 1989 elections, died In New Delhi on Thursday after prolonged illness.
Terming the Third Front as the "biggest mirage" of Indian politics, the Congress on Thursday said whenever the grouping has resurrected, it has only helped the communal forces.
While they are trying to unite different parties to form a non-Bharatiya Janata Party, non-Congress alliance at the Centre, the Communist Party of India - Marxist and the Communist Party of India on Monday intensified their tussle over the Ponnani Lok Sabha constituency in northern Kerala's Mallapuram district.After the CPI announced its intention two days earlier to field its own candidate from that seat, the CPI-M's Central Committee today put its foot down.
Indicating further closeness with the Mayawati-led party, the Communist Party of India-Marxist has asked its cadre to vote for "non-Congress secular parties like Bahujan Samaj Party" in the coming state elections where the party and the CPI are not contesting.
Home Minister P Chidambaram has written a letter to all the chief ministers dispelling their misgivings on the National Investigating Agency and two other Bills passed by Parliament in December, stressing that the laws will help fight terrorism effectively.
The Third Front, which has a history of mutative existence, hops into the new year with the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhgham joining the group of disparate parties ganging up on a non-Congress, non-Bharatiya Janata Party platform.
As of Thursday, June 18, Narendra Modi and Amit Shah did not have an escape route to save the Rajasthan chief minister.
As the first step, senior BJP Vice President and Convenor for the Lok Sabha polls, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, convened an hour long meeting with Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Ajit Singh, who is officially with the United National Progressive Alliance. RLD members have been sulking against a non-starter alliance stuck with Bahujan Samaj Party of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati.
The CPI-M is upbeat in its quest to form a Third Front and struck a pre-poll alliance with the BJD in Orissa within a day after the ruling state party snapped ties with longtime ally BJP.
The reverses for the BJP in the Hindi heartland threw wide open the 2019 Lok Sabha elections which until a few months ago appeared to be in the grip of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party.
Congress will be batting for itself and not for its allies and the focus would be on key leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, in an advertisement campaign to be launched by the party soon for Lok Sabha polls. Party chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would be the two other stars in the ad blitzkrieg.
Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Friday targeted the Centre and Congress president Sonia Gandhi in the wake of advisories sent to Karnataka and Orissa over attacks on some churches there. "The statement issued by the government of India to Karnataka and Orissa is a part of votebank politics. Madam ko 355 candles ki aarti utaari gayi hai. (It is an act to please Madam)", he said in an obvious reference to Sonia.
Born in Rangoon (now Yangon, Myanmar) Rupani, 61, joined an RSS shakha as a schoolboy, before graduating to the BJP via the Sangh's students wing -- the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad.
'The Modi Model we see now is still the old Gujarat Model.' 'But with an acknowledgement that governing India is more challenging than governing Gujarat,' notes Shekhar Gupta.
Mamatha Nichani speaks about her political ambitions, her thoughts on the political scenario and her decision to join the Congress, a party which her father, Ramakrishna Hegde, had opposed all his life.
After the break over the nuclear deal, the CPI (M) has ruled out supporting the Congress in forming the government at the Centre.
Andhra Pradesh chief minister-designate N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demanded special category status for the residual state.
Signaling its keenness to create a third alternative along with the United National Progressive Alliance, the Left Front on Thursday announced that they will coordinate with the alliance against the government over the India-United States nuclear agreement and other issues. The Left, which provides crucial outside support to the ruling United Progressive Alliance, dropped hints of its intention to stitch a non-Congress and non-BJP alliance.
Sen was given the notice after members from most of the non-Congress parties slammed him for his reported 'derogatory' remark in connection with the controversy over Indo-US civilian nuclear deal.
'It is entirely possible that Sonia Gandhi wants her son to be prime minister.' 'If so, it is game, set and match to the BJP,' says T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan.
If they decide to support Shekhawat, who might enter the fray as an Independent, it would still amount to compromising their basic idea of maintaining equi-distance from both Congress and BJP.
The results are a ringing endorsement of Modi's popularity, his government's achievements in the last five years and his campaign, which centred around national security, nationalism and Hindutva.
Earlier, KCR had met West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee as part of efforts to build a non-Congress, non-BJP third front ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
'If Narendra Modi and Amit Shah will campaign here, the BJP's defeat will be bigger.'
Efforts like the United National Progressive Alliance are a 'result of some honest efforts but the real third force will come into being only in the post-poll scenario', he said while disagreeing that a third force was already in place. The 75-year old veteran socialist claimed his relationship with Congress leadership was 'never strained' though he was pained by the fact that none in the Congress camp tried to 'acknowledge' his efforts to keep away BJP.
Distancing herself from the United National Progressive Alliance floated by non-Congress and non-BJP parties a few months ago, All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam chief Jayalalithaa on Thursday said there was "no such thing called the Third Front".
Political leaders bid an emotional goodbye to Vajpayee.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist on Sunday said it would forge a 'third alternative' of non-Congress, non-Bharatiya Janata Party parties on a common policy platform, as it did not agree with the policies pursued by the two major parties.
It was after a long time that a senior BJP leader had met Jayalalithaa, whose party had severed ties with it after the 2004 Lok Sabha polls.
The leaders were understood to have discussed the possible formation of a non-Congress, non-BJP government at the Centre 'on a long-term basis'.
Apart from Sangma, 11 other cabinet ministers were also sworn in by the governor.
'The Congress has collapsed and is fighting for survival. Other parties carry no weight in comparison to the BJP. This situation does not augur well for democracy,'
Terming West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's call for a Federal Front as a "ploy" to increase her bargaining power with Congress and BJP before the 2014 polls, the Left parties feel it cannot be successful without a common minimum programme.
He spoke of the possibility of all non-Congress parties, including the BJP coming together under a common programme and asked the Left parties to lead such an alternative.\n
Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha and senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley feels the JD-U and SP, the prime movers behind the idea of Third Front, are 'potential losers' in their areas of influence, and are no match to Narendra Modi-led NDA.
In both the states where the Bharatiya Janata Party came second is trying to turn the tables on the Congress to form the government.
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