Elections for 19 Rajya Sabha seats spread across eight states will be held on Friday with the contest in Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan promising to be a close affair between the BJP and the Congress.
The party is using the two year occasion to launch its election campaign in the state, which was key to them reaching simple majority in the Lok Sabha in 2014.
Sources said the Congress leadership is also in talks with AAP leaders and senior leaders within the party are trying to convince Delhi Congress leaders for an alliance.
'You have been appointed general secretary of Samajwadi Party. I hope in the coming days you will strengthen the party in Uttar Pradesh assembly elections,' Mulayam said in a handwritten letter to Amar.
Polling in Phase II of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections consists of 67 constituencies spread across 11 districts.
The election in this seat is also important for Union minister and local MP Mahesh Sharma who has considerable influence the area.
Notwithstanding the claims and counterclaims of different political parties about riding the crest of a populatiry wave in Uttar Pradesh, Tuesday's results of the three bypolls out of the 403 state assembly seats have sprung surprises for all key political players.
Rahul Gandhi is more inclined towards Akhilesh, who has said their combination could win more than 300 of the 403 assembly seats.
Voicing concern over the Muzaffarnagar violence, Rashtriya Lok Dal leader and Union Minister Ajit Singh on Tuesday said it may spread to other states and become unmanageable" if not controlled by "strict action".
To a question whether his party will not forge a coalition with any political party, Azad said, "If any political party is willing to accompany the Congress, and the Congress feels that it can fight the BJP, then it will be definitely accommodated."
The BJP is still short of the halfway mark of 123 in the 245-member House, but can now muster a 'working' majority with help of allies, friendly parties, some Independents and nominated members.
Congress hopes to field upper caste candidates to eat into BJP voter base while SP-BSP focuses on consolidating Dalit-OBC votes in their favour.
He said the BJP is leaving a "culture", which may be used against it in the future.
Assembly elections in Bihar, where the Bharatiya Janata Party is set for a battle against a united Janata Parivar, are likely to be held sometime in September-October when extensive central forces and a reworked expenditure monitoring system will be deployed to curb money and muscle power.
Mulyama's remarks came against the backdrop of marathon meetings Congress' poll strategist Prashant Kishor had with him in Delhi and Lucknow.
The marathon meeting, spread over two sessions and kept under wraps, came a day after top leaders of socialist-leaning parties attended SP's silver jubilee meet here -- a move seen as an attempt by Mulayam to forge an alliance ahead of the assembly polls hardly a few months away.
Sources in the poll panel said, prima facie, Adityanath has violated the EC's advisory of keeping armed forces away from political campaign.
On the one side there is a strong 'chowkidar', on the other, a line of tainted people, the prime minister said.
Some of the key proposals of the agenda relate to transforming the banking sector, addressing agrarian distress, countering hate crimes and discrimination, and spurring employment generation.
SP has gained a majority in the 100-member Uttar Pradesh legislative council. The party had earlier faced difficulty pushing through its legislative in the upper house due to lack of numbers.
Allegations of electronic voting machines malfunctioningreturned to haunt the Election Commission as four Lok Sabha seats and nine assembly constituencies went for bypolls on Monday across 10 states with moderate-to-heavy voting amid prestige at stake for the Bharatiya Janata Party as well as opposition parties ahead of the 2019 general elections.
Ahead of the Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday talked to allies, informing them about the intent to withdraw the controversial Ordinance on convicted lawmakers.
Akhilesh Yadav confirmed in a television interview that the press conference is on the alliance in Uttar Pradesh, while parrying questions on the Congress.
Rashtriya Lok Dal chief Ajit Singh, BJP leader Ravi Shankar Prasad and two BJP MPs were on Monday detained by the police after they attempted to enter UP to visit violence-hit Muzaffarnagar district.
In the second phase on April 18, 97 seats,spread across 13 states and one Union Territory, will go to the polls.
The party also nominated six others, including former Union minister Beni Prasad Verma, an influential Kushwaha leader who recently quit Congress and returned to the Samajwadi Party, and realtor Sanjay Seth for the biennial polls scheduled next month.
It seems that in the 2019 general elections, people want Narendra Modi, but not necessarily the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate. Aditi Phadnis reports
The first phase of UP polls in 73 assembly constituencies on Saturday witnessed an "exemplary" 64.22 per cent voter turnout.
73 constituencies will vote on Saturday.
The saffron party is assured of victory in eight of the ten seats in UP going by its dominant numbers in the state assembly.
The Congress wants the 28 seats it won in 2012 plus 20 seats where the party was runner-up plus 57 seats where it was ahead of the SP in 2012.
The Congress's share has almost halved, down from 12 in 2014 to six now.
Ending months of speculation, expelled Samajwadi Party leader leaders Amar Singh and Jaya Prada joined the Ajit Singh-led Rashtriya Lok Dal on Monday ahead of Lok Sabha polls.
'How can Netaji forget Amar Singh called him names? He has come back to Netaji because he failed to gain entry in any political party.'
UP and Bihar contributed 105 seats to the BJP's tally in 2014. It has now lost 8 Lok Sabha by-polls in the last four years, including three successive losses in UP and two seats in Rajasthan.
All India Congress Committee general secretary in-charge of Uttar Pradesh Ghulam Nabi Azad said the party would not react immediately and would come out with a detailed reaction in Lucknow on Sunday.
Shatrughan Sinha won't attend, citing 'important personal engagements.' Will L K Advani be present? M I Khan reports on a swearing-in ceremony the likes of which Patna may not have seen before.
'In mocking him, Modi and Shah went horribly wrong.'
'It made Gandhi determined to fight to the finish, which now has the entire Sangh Parivar rattled,' says a Congress leader, privy to the repeated RSS outreach for a rapproachment.
It was a changed scenario in the new Lok Sabha with the churning brought out by the elections throwing in contrasts.
When the results for the Rae Bareli assembly seat came in on March 11, Aditi Singh (Congress) had won 128,319 votes, Mohammad Shabaz Khan of the BSP had won 39,156 votes and the BJP's Anit Srivastava had won 28,821 votes. It was a stunning victory for the US-educated rookie Congress candidate.
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