The ruling Bahujan Samaj Party, which has already crossed swords with the Congress, is all set to launch its campaign for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections from the bastion of Gandhi family -- Amethi and Rae Bareli -- on February 9. The party, while announcing its plan to organise Brahmin Sammelans across the state, has decided to organise its first convention in Amethi, parliamentary constituency of All India Congress Committee general secretary Rahul Gandhi.
A senior Indian Police Service officer deposed before a special Central Bureau of Investigation court on Friday as a prosecution witness in the 1992 Babri Masjid demolition case, in which L K Advani and other Sangh Parivar leaders have been accused of inciting violence.
"Some parts of West Bengal like Purulia had been described as the most backward in the country. A comparison of the socio-economic indicators of Purulia with those in Rae Bareli and Amethi will tell the real story," an editorial in the CPI-M mouthpiece People's Democracy said.
Fresh from victory in the Lok Sabha polls, Congress President Sonia Gandhi today said the results showed that people have rejected parties dabbling in caste politics or whipping up communal passions.
As the 15th Lok Sabha assembled for the first time on Monday, it was all in the family for many members. The House, which possibly has the highest number of members related to each other, saw fathers, daughters, sons and cousins assembling together under one roof as representatives of people. Leading the list were Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul, elected from Rae Bareli and Amethi respectively.
Oommen Chandy said the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee has requested Gandhi to contest from Wayanad but he has not commented on the proposal.
The move by the district administration in the Sonia-Mayawati battle for the political turf of Uttar Pradesh came hours after the Allahabad high court virtually stayed the state government's decision cancelling the land allotment for a railway project in Sonia's Lok Sabha constituency in Rae Bareily.
Pulok Chatterjee, a long time loyalist of the Gandhi family and Dr Manmohan Singh, is likely to succeed K M Chandrasekhar as the Union Cabinet Secretary from January 2010. Chatterjee has served as the district magistrate of Rae Bareli and later worked with Sonia Gandhi, when she was the Leader of Opposition, during the National Democratic Alliance regime. When the United Progressive Alliance came to power, Chatterjee was made the Joint Secretary in PMO.
Anti-Congress regional parties may have felt the possible impact of Rahul's South-North yatra, pending a second East-West padayatra, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The special court is hearing the 1992 demolition cases, including the one against BJP leaders L K Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Uma Bharti.
A senior IPS officer, who deposed that BJP leader L K Advani had made a provocative speech in Ayodhya moments before the Babri masjid was demolished by Sangh Parivar activists in 1992, was on Friday cross-examined by the defence in a Rae Bareli special court.
Even as suspense continues over alliance between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party, the SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav has said his party would not field candidates against the United Progressive Alliance chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.
The top court, which had earlier fixed August 31 as the deadline for completion of proceedings including pronouncement of the verdict, took note of the report filed by special judge S K Yadav in the high-profile case.
Sources said BJP working president J P Nadda called up Singh to inform him of the party's decision and asked him to make an announcement.
Speaking at a Balika Suraksha Jaagruktaa Abhiyaan programme at a school in Barabanki on Wednesday, a student asked, "If the person against whom we are complaining comes to know about it, and if we have an accident, what will happen?"
Addressing media persons in Lucknow, Mayawati said, "The Congress is worried only about Rae Bareli, but I am worried about the whole of Uttar Pradesh." Denying allegations of Sonia that her government was against development, Mayawati alleged that the Congress had put impediments in state government's schemes like Ganga and Yamuna expressways.
Enthused scenes of Congress support in Rae Bareli.
A number of Congress leaders across the country have gone against the party's stand in Parliament on abrogation of the provisions of Article 370 of the Constitution in Jammu and Kashmir by supporting the Centre's move and a bill to bifurcate the state. The Congress has strongly opposed the move and the bill to bifurcate the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union territories.
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 Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to interfere with the criminal proceedings in cases relating to the demolition of disputed structure at Ayodhya in which the trial involving senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani and seven others VVIPs were segregated from others.
She left the agency's office in central Delhi just before 7 pm on Tuesday after recording her statement.
With their high-decibel campaigns so far, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Samajwadi Party may appear to be locked in a direct fight in Uttar Pradesh.
Fifteen years after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, a Central Bureau of Investigations court in Rae Bareli on Wednesday commenced trial of the case in which senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani and seven Sangh Parivar leaders are accused.
Does India's first political family see some serious threat to its own bastions? The question was doing rounds in Uttar Pradesh, where lie Rae Bareli and Amethi -- the respective parliamentary constituencies of Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice president son Rahul Gandhi. Sharat Pradhan reports.
Making a U-turn, the Mayawati government in Uttar Pradesh on Saturday decided to return the land in Rae Bareli for construction of a rail coach factory, an issue on which she had a high-pitched spat with Congress President Sonia Gandhi during the week.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi vacated the seat in the wake of office of profit controversy.
Swamy alleged that Sonia had given false information in the poll affidavit filed by her before the Rae Bareli Returning Officer.
The Delhi Police's Special Cell on Tuesday busted a Pakistan-organised terror module with the arrest of six men, including two ISI trained terrorists.
Give safety and security first to the people, say MPs.
Rahul Gandhi spent 45 minutes with the Dalai Lama.
Sonia Gandhi, who was also embroiled in the controversy is seeking re-election today.
Referring to her party's pre-poll alliance with the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh, she said it was based on "mutual respect" and "honest intentions", adding that "the SP-BSP alliance is perfect enough to defeat the BJP, especially in Uttar Pradesh.
The core groups had a separate wing of women workers.
Eleven deaths have been reported in Saharanpur followed by 10 in Meerut, six in Agra, four in Mainpuri, three each in Muzaffarnagar and Kasganj, two each in Amroha, Bareilly, Baghpat and Bulandshahr and one each in Kanpur Dehat, Mathura, Ghaziabad, Hapur, Rae Bareli, Jalaun, Jaunpur, Pratapgarh, Banda, Firozabad, Amethi, Kanpur and Pilibhit, they said.
Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra appears to have shed the maximum sweat among top leaders for over the last 45 days in the seven-phase Uttar Pradesh assembly elections campaign.
The toll in NTPC's Unchahar plant accident has climbed to 34, making it the country's worst industrial disaster in the last eight years.
