Chhagan Bhujbal, Jayant Patil (both from the NCP), Balasaheb Thorat and Nitin Raut (both from the Congress), Eknath Shinde and Subhash Desai (both from the Sena) took oath as ministers along with Thackeray.
Sources reveal that the Assam chief minister may be on his way out even as it seems that his Haryana and Maharashtra counterparts will survive the crisis. Rediff.com contributor Anita Katyal reports.
'The Congress's allies won't be left behind in looking out for their own interests. Some will demand a bigger share of the ministerial or electoral pie, others will simply jump ship,' says T V R Shenoy.
This is the first meeting chaired by Gandhi after relinquishing the post of Congress president last year.
With almost all opposition parties too backing the 'Bharat bandh' and many announcing parallel protests in support of the farmers, the Centre has issued an advisory directing the states and Union Territories to tighten security and ensure peace is maintained.
It is regrettable that the IB has tried to devalue the expertise available both within the concerned ministry and in the scientific community by its allegations. Governments and NGOs in many western nations have not been accused of being 'anti-national' when they put their foot down on questionable practices by cash rich agri-business companies, says Rashme Sehgal.
The IMD has fancy weather-monitoring radars in the name of providing better forecasts.
From President Pranab Mukherjee's son Abhijit to Rahul and Varun Gandhi, at least 50 parliamentary constituencies will be contested by 'sons and daughters' of politicians of various parties during the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh is coming under increasing fire from his own party colleagues for quite a few reasons, says Anita Katyal
The Indian economy was on an impressive growth path through the first decade of this century till it was brought to an abrupt halt by the policy inertia during UPA2 and the Modi government's inability to restore economic and financial momentum. Fascinating glimpses of what went wrong from Puja Mehra's must-read book The Lost Decade: How India's Growth Story Devolved Into Growth Without A Story.
Over 3,500 police personnel have deployed as the farmers began their march from the Ramlila Maidan to Parliament at 10.30 am.
A Ganesh Nadar speaks to onion farmers in Nashik, India's largest wholesale onion market, about the high prices.
Any official-level talks between India and Sri Lanka, without any clear-cut understanding on the livelihood issues, could end up in India having to acknowledge bilaterally even more than what it had no hesitation in accepting in Parliament and outside, says N Sathiya Moorthy
Governments in most of the world saw their approval ratings dip as they struggled to contain the raging virus, which hit economy hard everywhere, but Indian politics followed a different script, with the outgoing year marking further shrinking of a rudderless Congress while the ruling BJP soared riding on Modi's enduring appeal.
This alliance is for personal survival, not ideology-based support. This alliance is for power, not for the people. This alliance is for personal ambitions, not people's aspirations," the PM charged.
Let the implementation of reforms be left to the discretion of individual states and ensure an end to the illogical stir, argues Virendra Kapoor.
'This government is so fond of some corporate friends that they can always amend existing laws or make new laws.'
Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is hailed as the architect of economic reforms in the country, is a member of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, it was announced on Tuesday.
With almost all opposition parties and several trade unions backing the 'Bharat Bandh' and many announcing parallel protests in support of the farmers, the Centre has issued an advisory directing all the states and Union Territories to tighten security and ensure COVID guidelines are followed.
Marathas, a politically influential community that constitutes around 30 per cent of the state's population, have been demanding 16 per cent reservation in government jobs and education.
'People accused of mass murder and worse are let out on medical grounds.' 'Saibaba is now 100% handicapped, and has committed no murder, yet he is not allowed to come out.'
Modi is as divorced from reality as Manmohan Singh. He might want to sound expansive and visionary, but to be credible he must have his feet on the ground and know the reality around him. Instead of delivering irrelevant homilies to small and hence poor farmers, the prime minister should be thinking in terms of creating a huge demand for alternative employment, mainly in the construction sector, and his promised hundred new cities is a capital idea, says Mohan Guruswamy.
With the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party seat-sharing talks deadlocked over the latter's insistence on getting more seats to contest the assembly polls, Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan on Sunday said he is against breaking the alliance but party workers feel the ally's "body language is anti-Congress".
Most farmers want to give Modi a second chance. They hope that the BJP loses at least 50 seats, so that it is dependent on its coalition partners who will then keep a check on Modi.
'At the end of the day, there will largely be a single candidate against the NDA's.' 'That itself will produce a different result altogether.'
The Congress, out of power in UP for 27 years is making a big pitch to bounce back, on a cocktail of caste politics and promises of agriculture debt waiver worth Rs 49,000 crore and power rate reduction for farmers hit by high input costs and diminishing returns., reports Amit Agnihotri.
In a country where 35 to 40 per cent of food is not consumed, the government urgently needs to reduce wastage to an acceptable level.
How has Raj Thackeray, who is as much a businessman as politician, been able to pull it off, when most Opposition politicians live in fear of IT and ED and CBI, asks Krishna Prasad after attending a Raj rally in Nashik.
It, however, lags other states on crucial parameters such as health care and rural poverty.
It is a fight for survival for the Nationalist Congress Party in Maharashtra, which has been its citadel. In an interview party President Sharad Pawar speaks on the NCP's prospects and how the Bharatiya Janata Party is exploiting Narendra Modi's popularity in the state assembly elections.
'Let us not say that Modi has not delivered on anything; he has delivered something and in parts substantially, but he has to also deliver on a large number of his electoral promises.'
The opposition has attacked the Modi government over the National Democratic Alliance's last full-fledged budget before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
If the AAP wins 20 to 40 Lok Sabha seats, which is conceivable unless it botches up on governance in Delhi, it will become a significant bloc comparable in influence to or even bigger than several major regional parties, feels Praful Bidwai.
The kind of people Narendra Modi has chosen, the decisions he has taken and the rail and central budgets suggests that he is treading carefully in New Delhi. There is less of innovation and more of continuity, so far. He is not ready to rock the boat and start from scratch, says Sheela Bhatt.
'No right thinking student of politics can name one state where the BJP gains in double digits.'
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