In 2017, a retired R&AW officer conveyed that Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath was keen to get monarchy restored in Nepal and suggested that I support these efforts.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday said the challenge of the Covid pandemic is not fully over yet, with the increase in coronavirus cases in the last two weeks manifesting the need to stay alert, and underlined that vaccination remains the biggest protective shield against the virus.
The devotion to the deity is such that even commerce is not untouched by the spiritual feel in the holy city. Images of the grand temple is finding places even on visiting cards, posters, calendars and even signages.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and the tribal face of the party, Vishnu Deo Sai, on Wednesday took oath as the chief minister of Chhattisgarh, 10 days after the saffron party returned to power after a gap of five years by unseating Congress in the assembly elections.
Without naming Gandhi and referring to the Congress leader's remarks made in London -- that structures of Indian democracy are under 'brutal attack', Modi termed it an insult to 12th century social reformer Basaveshwara, the people of Karnataka, India's great traditions and its citizens.
Wrapping up his two-day visit to Varanasi, Modi said work done in the city is clearly visible.
The decision to terminate his services faced severe criticism on social media.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party won the mayoral elections in 10 of the 17 municipal corporations in Uttar Pradesh, results for which were announced on Saturday, virtually adding a third engine to its "double-engine" government.
To beat BJP, you either deny them a critical mass of Hindu vote or build a regional leader and party strong enough to protect their turf, observes Shekhar Gupta.
'You are one of the drops that make that ocean, but when you leave it makes no difference to the ocean.'
Yogi Adityanath took the oath as Uttar Pradesh chief minister at the auspicious time of 1600, Friday, March 25, 2022, at the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana cricket stadium in Lucknow.
In 2011, Modi had refused to wear a skullcap.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has said that after fulfilling Bharatiya Janata Party's poll promise on Ram Temple construction in Ayodhya, work has begun in Mathura and Vrindavan as well.
Names of BJP veterans like L K Advani and Murli Manohar Joshi also do not figure in the list.
Known for delivering time-bound results, Sharma earned Modi's confidence as his secretary during his tenure as the Gujarat chief minister by successfully handling the Vibrant Gujarat campaign to get investments to the state.
If the Opposition has any chance at the prime minister's job, it can happen only if they all stop dropping names and work at the grassroots-level, state-wise, suggests N Sathiya Moorthy.
With no apparent wave on the ground or pressing everyday issues, that's what it boils down for voters as Rajasthan readies for assembly polls this week.
The BJP campaign highlighted Yogi's persona as a tough-as-nails leader and an incorruptible man with no nest to feather; Modi's charisma which was turned on full blast in the penultimate phases; Amit Shah's ground work; a well-oiled party organisation, and the RSS's back-up.
Spread over 10 districts, polling in these constituencies will be held from 7 am till 6 pm on Thursday.
Campaigning for the first phase of the Gujarat assembly elections to be held on December 1 ended at 5 pm on Tuesday.
Uttar Pradesh Bharatiya Janata Party's working committee member Ram Iqbal Singh on Thursday said there would have been no agitation by farmers had the Centre consulted them before enacting the new agricultural laws.
The BJP stormed back to power in the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh, trouncing its main rival SP, with Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath asserting that people have buried the politics of caste and religion.
'The brutal violence of the UP government's first response to the anti-CAA protests suggests that the BJP will test drive the NPR/NRC in UP, where it has both a massive majority in the assembly and a chief minister whose instinct for Hindutva extremism and whose appetite for punitive policing allows a prime minister as darkly majoritarian as Modi to appear statesman-like,' notes Mukul Kesavan.
"If you look at newspapers, you will see that Modi Ji was the first to greet Yogij Ji (on birthday). In fact, we are of the view that Yogi ji is the most competent implement to fulfil the dreams of Modijee," he said.
The BJP's 2022 assembly election win may have further consolidated Adityanath's stock within the BJP. The saffron party is now set to win the UP state polls twice in a row, a feat achieved by no other party in three decades.
The ceremony on Friday will be attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and chief ministers of Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states.
Religion matters. Aspirational India is still poor. India admires strong leaders. India values decency. Shreekant Sambrani highlights the reasons why the BJP pulled off improbable victories in the Hindi heartland.
'Modi wants to go down in history not necessarily as India's first overtly Hindu RSS pracharak prime minister, but as a world statesman who built the idea of India as a great nation.'
"The way in which UP has controlled the second Covid wave and stopped its spread is unprecedented," the prime minister, who arrived at his parliamentary constituency earlier in the morning on Thursday, said while addressing a gathering.
'What are the circumstances at that time? Had you thought Modi will come after Vajpayee?'
How Modi retrieves the situation and how he enlists new allies in the next two years will show if the BJP is fighting fit, report Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
The districts where polling is being held on Thursday are Ambedkar Nagar, Balrampur, Siddharth Nagar, Basti, Sant Kabir Nagar, Maharajganj, Gorakhpur, Kushinagar, Deoria and Ballia.
The impact of the explosion was so intense that the roofs of some of the factories located in the vicinity were damaged.
Today, Pakistan and Afghanistan are feeling disturbed because of the Taliban, Yogi said.
The Union minister asked Gandhi to "follow the law "and secure acquittal from a higher court.
Despite the national capital recording its best air quality on Diwali day in eight years, pollution levels may rise due to low night temperatures and sporadic burning of firecrackers though there is a ban on their manufacture, storage, sale and use within the city.
The ministers who failed to find places in the second term of the BJP government in the state included Dinesh Sharma, Satish Mahana, Ashutosh Tandon, Shrikant Sharma, Siddharth Nath Singh, and others.
'What has hit me between the eyes is Modi's seeming utter contempt for public perception of the yogi being an unrepentant bigot who also carries the baggage of many criminal cases against him,' says B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
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