Veteran politician and former railway minister Mukul Roy, a key figure in West Bengal politics, has died due to cardiac arrest, marking the end of a significant era.
The Rajya Sabha currently has 19 government Bills pending, with the oldest dating back to 1992. These bills cover a range of issues including population control, rent control, seed quality, migrant workers, and tribal autonomy.
The revelation may have come late in the century but the Congress disclosed on Thursday, May 29, 2025, that the Indian Army conducted six surgical strikes against Pakistan during UPA-2, the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government's second term in power.
'A man who brought about the greatest set of economic reforms in the country, who changed the course of Indian history, cannot be considered weak.' 'A man who fought for nuclear reforms even though his majority in Parliament was threatened, he cannot be considered weak.'
The government has to specify what it intends to do with caste census data. It will be closely tracked if the government would simultaneously move towards removing the present 50% bar on reservations using means which are permitted in law. If this is not done, the entire exercise will become meaningless and could boomerang on the BJP, observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
'All the big things happening today in economic development have their beginning in Dr Manmohan Singh's ideas.'
'The government must give up its neo-liberal polices and obsession with GDP growth and shift its ideological centre of gravity leftwards.'
At the end of UPA-2's three years in power, India has become a more unbalanced, strife-torn and unhappy society, with reduced human security and tattered social cohesion. Rather than correct policy course, the government deals with the resulting discontent with brute force, says Praful Bidwai
The preferred format would be for the top BJP leadership in the government to reach out to the alliance leaders on a case-to-case basis.
The former Union minister also slammed Shashi Tharoor for his statement that praising the Prime Minister Narendra Modi for doing the right things would lend credibility to the opposition's criticism of him.
There is a lack of connect between the Congress president and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in UPA-2. But Sonia Gandhi has ensured that the government does not waver from her pet policies -- NREGA, RTI etc, notes Neerja Chowdhury.
There is no use of the BJP targeting the likes of Mamata Banerjee and M K Stalin, directly by the party's political bosses, both in Delhi and the respective state capitals, or even using the Raj Bhavans to fire those salvos from. Successive elections have proved that it's counter-productive, if anything. But the BJP is yet to understand it, acknowledge it, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'The PM who is first among equals, who has to listen to others, take their point of view into account and who would have to be a good manager'
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The 78-year-old Naveen is on the cusp of creating history. He must win the forthcoming Assembly polls to become India's longest-serving chief minister, a record held by Sikkim's Pawan Kumar Chamling.
'Modigate is snowballing into a huge thing with the electorate. The BJP is in for huge punishment by the electorate.'
'Karna is the greatest warrior in the Mahabharata -- in fact, Arjuna is a nobody in front of Karna.' 'But Arjuna had a better advisor in Krishna than Karna.' 'Karna failed because he listened to the wrong advice given by Salya.' 'It just shows wrong advisors can land even the mighty in trouble.'
What the INDIA alliance needs is neither a counter to Modi's tall personality and undiminished charisma nor a counter-narrative to his Hindutva agenda, now centred on the Ayodhya temple consecration on January 22, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Haryana Bharatiya Janata Party leader Birender Singh on Monday threatened to quit the party if does not sever ties with the Jannayak Janta Party, which he accused of indulging in rampant corruption in the state.
She lashed out at the BJP and Leader of Opposition in West Bengal assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, for "threatening" Trinamool Congress leaders with arrests by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate.
"The remark is disgraceful and unfortunate," Dr Singh told reporters in Parliament when asked to comment on Advani's statement in Lok Sabha.
Yadav also pressed for the caste census which, he said, would be a major issue in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Sibal, a prominent Opposition voice and a former Congress leader, also said that instead of a common minimum programme, the Opposition parties should talk about a 'new vision for India'.
'The provincial universities have already been lost at the hands of unscrupulous politicians, the central universities are fast moving towards deep degeneration.'
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati will boycott the United Progressive Alliance-II anniversary celebrations and the subsequent dinner in New Delhi on Saturday.
With this kind of coinage, the Opposition seems to be readily conceding the point that Modi is taller than all of them put together. So they need something bigger than themselves, collectively or not, to capture the voter imagination when it is about taking on Modi and the BJP in 2024, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The United Progressive Alliance government, led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, has three more ambitious plans for Below Poverty Line families, a source in the government told rediff.com
As Azad ended his decades-old association with the party, leaders across political spectrum praised his contribution to Jammu and Kashmir, with the BJP hailing him as a "towering leader".
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held a press conference on Monday in New Delhi to mark the completion of one year of the United Progressive Alliance government in its second term. Following is the text of the prime minister's opening remarks on the occasion.
Noted economist and senior Trinamool Congress leader Amit Mitra is likely to step down as the West Bengal finance minister and even retire from active politics due to ill health, party sources said on Sunday.
'The more you challenge her, the more powerful she gets'
Ajit Singh represented a bridge between a constituency that represented a more traditional era in politics and a modern, forward-looking, India, remembers Aditi Phadnis.
You aren't dealing with a normal, civilised, law. The NDPS Act, in its preconditions for bail, and insistence on evidence of innocence rather than guilt, is worse than UAPA. Imagine yourself or your child at the other end of this, observes Shekhar Gupta.
'The Congress saw Rahul as the natural leader of the party and wanted him to take a larger role'
For the entire UPA regime, from 2005-06 to 2013-14, the average annual farm growth according to the GDP back series data is 3.8 per cent, which too is higher than the first four years of the NDA, though these two periods aren't comparable because one spans nine years and the other four.
'I could have joined the BJP in 2014, the doors were open.' 'I stayed on with the TMC, a party I was involved with since its very inception.' 'But today enough is enough.'
'Play safe and persist with an ailing Sonia Gandhi as interim chief and wait for an opportune moment to foist the crown prince yet again,' predicts Virendra Kapoor.
In a move that shows the urgency and seriousness with which the UPA 2 is planning the execution of first phase of direct cash transfer scheme before the January 1, 2013, deadline it has set for itself, the Union government has notified formation of two core committees -- called Mission Mode Committees -- tasked with rollout of the scheme. Prasanna D Zore reports from New Delhi.
There are actually great similarities between the two PM
'The only loser is the tax payer who doesn't have a clue as to how his money is being used.'
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