The Madhya Pradesh Congress demanded an apology from the BJP for "insulting" the defence forces.
After Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra began criss-crossing the Hindi heartland, BJP leaders have revived their attacks on 'dynasty politics' and 'family rule' in the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of the agitating unions, is meeting on Sunday to decide on the next course of action, including on the MSP issue and the proposed daily tractor march to Parliament during the upcoming Winter Session, SKM core committee member Darshan Pal said.
During a session titled 'Sustaining Democracy; Nurturing Democracy', he claimed that tightening the already stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) in a way that kept people like Siddique Kappan in jail for two years without bail is one of the many ways the current dispensation has 'managed to depart from the democratic spirit of the Constitution'.
People at a PDS shop in Hemda village in Karnal district were allegedly forced to buy Rs 20 tri-colour flags otherwise they won't get a ration.
Amateur Kabaddi Federation of India (AKFI) on Wednesday washed its hands off the incident of the organisers of a state-level sub-junior girls' tournament allegedly serving food from a toilet in Uttar Pradesh's Saharanpur, saying the national body was not in any way involved in the staging of the event.
Hitting out at actor Kangana Ranaut for describing India's Independence in 1947 as bheek or alms, the Congress on Thursday said her remarks amounted to 'treason' and demanded the government take back the Padma Shri bestowed on her recently as she has 'insulted' the country's Independence movement.
'Why did Varun Gandhi run away from Pilibhit? He leaves the constituency which he wins by a 300,000 margin and remembers his father's constituency in the second election?' 'A person who goes by the Gandhi name would stand with the Congress. All Varun Gandhi's ancestors were with the Congress. He left the legacy a long time ago,' the Congress's Ameeta Singh, the national badminton player-turned-politician who is contesting the Sultanpur seat against Varun Gandhi, tells Swarupa Dutt/Rediff.com
The Manikarnika actor, known for provocative and often inflammatory statements, was once again the centre of debate -- and ire -- with politicians across the spectrum, including Bharatiya Janata Party MP Varun Gandhi, among the host of social media users and others who reacted with outrage for her comments at an event on Wednesday evening.
The Aam Aadmi Party on Tuesday alleged that the Indian Army was using caste as a factor for recruitment under the Agnipath scheme, drawing a swift rebuttal from Defence Minister Rajnath Singh who rejected the charge as a "rumour".
Maneka Gandhi will contest from Sultanpur and Varun Gandhi from Pilibhit.
Varun Gandhi explains why he has moved a private member's bill in Parliament enabling voters to recall their representatives.
Pitching for her son and Sultanpur member of Parliament, Union Minister Maneka Gandhi has said that Uttar Pradesh would have benefited had there been a Bharatiya Janata Party led government in the state with Varun Gandhi as its chief minister.
Okay so Varun Gandhi has put an end to speculation about a "Gandhi vs Gandhi" electoral face-off in the 2014 Lok Sabha election. The bigger story of the day, however, here is the strange relationship that the Gandhi siblings -- Rahul and Varun -- and their families share. Rediff.com's Anita Katyal reports
'In the last decade, Parliamentarians had sought for an increase of 400 per cent for their compensation.' 'Have we really earned this massive increment?'
The actor, known for her provocative and often inflammatory statements, posted a series of questions on Instagram, also bringing in Partition as well as Mahatma Gandhi and alleging that he let Bhagat Singh die and did not support Subhas Chandra Bose.
The firestorm that Kangana Ranaut kicked with her comment that the Independence India won in 1947 was bheek intensified on Friday with leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party and other parties demanding action against the actor even as a complaint was filed against her while some people took to the streets to burn her effigies.
'Everybody knows Mayawati sells party tickets and even her party members take pride in telling this'
Ashish Mishra, son of Union minister of state for home Ajay Mishra, was produced before a court here late on Saturday night, which sent him to 14-day judicial custody in connection with the October 3 Lakhimpur violence.
"BJP disassociates and disapproves the contents of the speech and the comments attributed to Varun Gandhi. We have not received any notice from the Election commission on the issue," BJP spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said in New Delhi as the saffron party distanced itself from the controversy.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Sushma Swaraj held a meeting with Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday morning to discuss the various aspects of the security threat to BJP Member of Parliament Varun Gandhi.However, Swaraj expressed her dissatisfaction over the outcome of the meeting. "I will not give the details of our conversation but I can tell you that there were differences in the perception of threat to Varun Gandhi," she told a press conference later in the day.
The BJP today said in the Lok Sabha that party MP Varun Gandhi's life was under threat from an underworld outfit and demanded upgrading of his security.
A compact disc containing the alleged hate speeches of BJP leader Varun Gandhi, which created a furore ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, was "not doctored", the Hyderabad-based Forensic Science Laboratory has said in its report.
Referring to Modi, Adityanath and Union Home Minister Amit Shah as 'outsiders', the farmer leader said he has no objection if they become prime ministers after winning polls from Uttarakhand or Gujarat.
The Uttar Pradesh government grappled on Monday with the aftermath of violence during a farmers protest in Lakhimpur Kheri, lodging a case against Union minister Ajay Mishra's son, promising a probe by a retired high court judge and stopping opposition leaders from reaching the trouble spot.
Trains were set afire and blocked, and public vehicles attacked as protests over 'Agnipath' swept across several places in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Jammu on Thursday amid partisan political voices in favour and against the new recruitment scheme for the defence forces that has set off a firestorm.
While grinding poverty remains in Amethi, the Rajiv Gandhi Mahila Vikas Pariyojna, an umbrella body of 1,200 self-help groups, has helped several women feed their families.
The action group will be known as Parliamentarians with Innovators for India (PIIndia.org), which aims to spur innovators to solve challenges in areas such as public health, economy, and livelihood. While the 14 parliamentarians come from different states and across party lines, the group has organisations like Population Foundation of India, Centre for Policy Research, Omnicuris, apart from top experts in public health and policy.
Congress on Wednesday distanced itself from Union minister Beni Prasad Verma's tirade against Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav saying it does "not approve" of anybody using "objectionable" language against any person or any community.
Varun Gandhi on Wednesday gave a new twist to the prime ministerial candidate race in the Bharatiya Janata Party, comparing party president Rajnath Singh to Atal Bihari Vajpayee and saying he has the ability to bring together people of different religions and castes.
Sultanpur member of Parliament and Bharatiya Janata Party leader Varun Gandhi and his wife Yamini were blessed with a baby girl on Monday.
The appointment of aggressive campaigners like Varun Gandhi, Uma Bharti, Ananth Kumar and Ajit Shah in senior positions within the party is a clear indication of which way the BJP wind is going to blow.
The third phase of Lok Sabha elections scheduled for Tuesday will see the maximum number of seats going to the polls in a single phase -- 117 across 15 states and Union Territories. It will also be a test for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party which will aim to defend the maximum number of seats at 62. This time the BJP will be tested in its bastion Gujarat -- where polling will be held for all the 26 Lok Sabha seats in the state -- apart from Karanataka, Chhattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh, where the party had done well in 2014. Here are some of the big political leaders' who await their fate on Tuesday.
Nitin Tyagi is a young farmer in Budhagaon village of Baghpat district of Uttar Pradesh. A few years ago, Tyagi left his fairly lucrative job in the medical industry and shifted base to his ancestral village to look after his land and property. He opened a small shop selling farm inputs in the village and also started taking a greater interest in agricultural matters which had so far been looked after by his father and uncles. Tyagi and his brothers primarily grow sugarcane, potato and wheat on nearly 10 acres of land with sugarcane taking up most of his time and effort. Being one of the most important and lucrative cash crops of the region, sugarcane is directly linked to the fate of millions of farmers in west UP and with it, the electoral fortunes of political parties seeking their votes in the coming assembly polls.
Bharatiya Janata Party chief Raj Nath Singh appears to be grooming his new found blue-eyed boy Varun Gandhi as the party's key campaigner in Uttar Pradesh.
With Jammu and Kashmir assembly slated to discuss a resolution seeking clemency for Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, a Bharatiya Janata Party youth wing delegation on Sunday met President Pratibha Patil and said the death sentence awarded to the terrorist should be carried out or it would set a bad precedent.
After a sustained attack on the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party over the last three days, Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Thursday trained his guns on the Bharatiya Janata Party. Significantly, his first major attack on BJP came in parts of Pilibhit, the political turf of his first cousin and BJP member of Parliament Varun Gandhi. He accused BJP of making only "false and hollow promises" with the sole intent of serving its short-term political gains.
'When real issues hit everybody, the frenzy of Hindutva will start fading.'
Members of the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha on Saturday debated and discussed the issue of the Jan Lokpal bill, for which activist Anna Hazare has been on a hunger strike since the last 12 days.
Having finally acquired some prominence in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), recently nominated party national secretary Varun Gandhi landed in Lucknow on Wednesday afternoon, only to give sermons to not just party workers, but both colleagues as well as seniors.