Ending days of suspense, the Congress on Friday announced that Rahul Gandhi will contest the Lok Sabha elections from Rae Bareli, the constituency held by his mother Sonia Gandhi for the last two decades, and Kishori Lal Sharma, a close aide of the Gandhi family, will fight from Amethi.
P Chidambaram proposed that Sonia should be made the party's interim president.
In a letter to the prime minister, the Congress chief alleged that the new vaccine policy implies that the central government has abdicated its responsibility of providing free vaccine to all Indians between 18 and 45 years of age.
Sources said the decision was taken at a meeting of INDIA bloc leaders, who met on Friday morning in the chamber of Leader of Opposition Mallikarjun Kharge in Parliament House.
For the first time, Modi is eyeball to eyeball with his bete noire, sitting a few feet across him. Given the last 10 years, a confrontation between them was unavoidable, inevitable, points out Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
'The 2024 general elections proved that UP is not Gujarat.'
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Friday said after almost 12 months of Gandhian agitation, the repeal of three farm laws is a 'victory of the will of 62 crore farmers and sacrifices of more than 700 farmers who laid their lives for this struggle,' and hoped that the Bharatiya Janata Party government would have drawn some lessons for future.
Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi held a virtual meeting on Friday evening with leaders of 19 Opposition parties, including the chief ministers of some Opposition-ruled states, amid efforts to boost Opposition unity and evolve a common strategy against the National Democratic Alliance government.
'Nitish may take such a decision because he was the first person who was with the INDIA front.' 'He went back only because he did not get proper encouragement from the Congress.' 'Nitish will take a decision provided there is a strong alternative.' 'If he feels ours is a weak coalition, he will not come.' 'Then, this government will continue for five years.'
Gourav Vallabh joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday hours after he quit the Congress, saying he can neither raise anti-Sanatan slogans nor abuse "wealth creators" day in and day out and was joining the ruling party due to his support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's agenda of "Viksit Bharat".
Suspended Congress leader claims 100 letters to Sonia Gandhi over leadership change
The comment comes two days after state Congress president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said his party won't beg for seats from the TMC.
The meeting assumes significance as the Maha Vikas Agahdi government in Maharashtra led by Shiv Sena, NCP and the Congress is facing a turmoil after former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh alleged that the state's Home minister gave a target to cops for collect Rs 100 crore every month.
In her maiden speech at a political rally, Sunita also asked people whether Kejriwal should resign as Chief Minister.
The former CM is expected to sound the poll bugle for next year's Lok Sabha elections with the convention and rally.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday suggested that if the Congress comes to power, it would redistribute wealth of people to Muslims and cited former PM Manmohan Singh's remark that the minority community had the first claim on the country's resources.
The party also made it clear that no one will be permitted to undermine or weaken the party and its leadership. The CWC also resolved that inner-party issues cannot be deliberated through the media or in public fora and all such issues must be raised within the party 'in the interest of propriety and discipline'.
Kishore said the Congress and its supporters are bigger than any individual and Gandhi should not be stubborn that it must be him who will deliver for the party despite repeated failures.
The plea, filed by Delhi's water minister Atishi, has made the Centre, Bharatiya Janata Party-governed Haryana and Congress-ruled Himachal Pradesh parties to the petition and said access to water is essential for survival and one of the basic human rights.
The Gandhi-led yatra will pass through Amethi on Monday. It will then enter Raebareli, where the Samajwadi Party chief had earlier said he would join.
Yadav said all parties have joined hands against the BJP in the Bihar assembly, and added "now this is going to be replicated across the whole country".
A number of high-profile electoral battles, starring veterans and debutants, formidable opponents and unlikely contestants, feature in Tuesday's outcome.
On balance, RG contesting from Raebareli instead of Amethi isn't the masterstroke the party's adherents are touting it to be, but neither is it the blunder the BJP and its tame media is framing it as, points out Prem Panicker.
'Soniaji is like a mother to the party. We revere her even now'
Amid a series of deliberations over a strategy for upcoming general and assembly elections by poll strategist Prashant Kishor, a group of senior leaders of the Congress has given its recommendations to party president Sonia Gandhi and left it to her to take a call on them and initiate organisational changes.
'I came into politics to bring a smile on people's faces.'
Alleging that the BJP would end democracy if it was not voted out, Kharge said it was because of this democracy that a tea-seller's son could become the prime minister of India and he, the son of a labourer, could become the president of the opposition Congress.
'Let me reveal for the first time that around August 2019 Congress President Sonia Gandhi told the Congress leadership and CWC members to form a consensus over the name of a non-Gandhi leader.'
'Sonia is trying to become a politician again. Will she succeed?'
Didi will skip the meeting in protest against the violence unleashed in Bengal allegedly by Left Front and Congress workers during a trade union strike. She slammed the 'double standards' of the Congress and the Left.
A voter turnout of 10.82 per cent was recorded till 9 am on Saturday in 58 constituencies in six states and two Union territories where polling is underway in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections.
The leaders who Gandhi met included Deputy Leader of the party in the Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma and Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari. She is likely to meet some other leaders of the G-23 as well in the coming days.
'Rahul is not even a lamp before the sun'
Gandhi had decided not to celebrate her birthday because of rape incidents and assaults on women in the country.
He further added that the people of India respect different languages, religion, food and customs which varies from region to region. "That's the India that I believe in, where everybody has a place and everybody compromises little bit," he said.
The draft environment impact assessment (EIA) notification, 2020, which involves the procedure of issuing environmental clearances to various projects, was issued by the Environment Ministry in March this year and has received thousands of suggestions from the public.
He said with a view to releasing a white paper on the state's finances, the cabinet has asked the officials to furnish information on the expenditure made by the previous government from 2014 to December 7, 2023 on all departments in the state government and the purposes for which the expenditure was incurred.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) will get a 'decisive mandate' in the Lok Sabha polls and may take even less than 48 hours to decide on its prime ministerial pick, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said on Thursday, asserting that it stands to reason that the party which gets the maximum seats in the alliance will be a 'natural claimant' for its leadership.
The head of the Congress's first family has never been an astute politician, points out Amulya Ganguli.
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