Taking potshots at the Bharatiya Janata Party, some opposition leaders also wondered if Goel resigned to contest the Lok Sabha polls on its ticket like former Calcutta high court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay.
With the assembly poll results in three states being a disappointment for the Congress, some rumblings have begun among the constituents of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) ahead of their meeting on December 6, with many leaders alleging that the grand old party ignored others, but was unable to win elections on its own.
A voter turnout of over 40 per cent was recorded till 1 pm on Monday in the fourth phase of Lok Sabha elections in 96 constituencies spread over 10 states and Union Territories amid incidents of violence in Andhra Pradesh and reports of poll boycott in some villages of Uttar Pradesh.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Sunday took a potshot at Bharatiya Janata Party for raising the issue of 'love jihad'(affairs involving Muslim boys and Hindu girls) by suggesting that its MP Hema Malini had no qualms about acting in movies which showed such relationships.
Harping on putting up a united front, the Congress alleged that democracy is being "mercilessly murdered" and MPs who raise people's issues are suspended from the House.
The 30-member team will be headed by Malappuram Additional Superintendent of Police G Sabu, a government release said.
The notable names in the BJP's first list include Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh from Lucknow, Hema Malini from Mathura, Ajay Mishra Teni from Kheri, Smriti Irani from Amethi, Lallu Singh from Faizabad (Ayodhya) and Mahendra Nath Pandey from Chandauli among others.
Dr Sanjeev Gupta, medical director at Medanta Hospital in Gurugram said that the founder of the Samajwadi Party is being treated in the intensive care unit (ICU) of the hospital by a comprehensive team of specialists.
Ahead of the day-long Opposition meeting on Friday, Samvad Bhavan, Rajkiye Atithisala and Sadaquat Ashram have got a facelift.
Taking a cue from the massive victory of the Grand Alliance against the Bharatiya Janata Party in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav on Sunday said such a tie-up was possible in the state where assembly elections are due in early 2017.
Prayers were performed in a cellar of the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi on Wednesday night following court orders allowing the resumption of a practice said to have been discontinued three decades back, Kashi Vishwanath temple trust president said.
The police on Wednesday detained the father and uncle of the accused. The other accused, Sajid's brother Javed, is absconding, the police said.
'Laluji is like my father and I am like his son.'
'They (BJP) can claim of winning even 82 seats, despite the fact that Uttar Pradesh has only 80 seats'
This time Modi has no emotive message to take to the stump. Muscular nationalism doesn't work against the backdrop of China's successive inroads into Indian territory. Rising prices is a sore point that cuts across class and caste barriers; unprecedented levels of unemployment has the youth in a ferment. This has reduced the BJP campaign to a laundry list of recycled grievances and thinly veiled communal appeals, neither of which are working as well as they have in the past, argues Prem Panicker.
People had also started gathering at Mukhtar Ansari's residence in Ghazipur and there was a large deployment of security personnel around the house.
The Congress, meanwhile, alleged that both the Samajwadi Party and the BJP are hand-in-glove with the criminals and were two sides of the same coin.
According to insiders, their lack of enthusiasm is showing on the ground. There is nothing to suggest that their enthusiasm will return in the final four phases of polling, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav might have repeatedly castigated his Chief Minister son Akhilesh Yadav for his loose grip over the administration.
Kumar, a Dalit, as its candidate for president against NDA's nominee Ram Nath Kovind.
The Samajwadi Party is unwilling to cede ground to the BJP, especially in Amethi, since the Congress is too weak to counter the BJP's well-oiled election machinery.
The stakes are significant for the BJP in this round as the party had in 2019 won an overwhelming majority of these seats, including all in Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, that will go to polls on May 7.
Says Make in India could only succeed with Make in UP, given large sized population and market the state offers
The original suggestion was to call it 'Indian National Democratic Inclusive Alliance', but the word 'democratic' was replaced with 'developmental' after Kumar and Yechury raised some objections saying it sounded too similar to the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA), sources said.
This is the first meeting between Gandhi and Kumar since the latter walked out of the National Democratic Alliance in Bihar and formed a 'Mahagathbandhan' government with the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Congress and outside support of the Left.
Arvind Kejriwal warned the media that "very big forces" would try and break the INDIA alliance by showing that there was a lot of acrimony among them.
Ill-health forced Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to cancel his scheduled visit to Chennai on Tuesday, where he was invited by his Tamil Nadu counterpart MK Stalin, a key aide of the Janata Dal-United leader said.
The Yogi Adityanath government on Wednesday transferred 20 senior IAS officers, shunting out Principal Secretary-Information Navneet Sehgal and others who wielded considerable influence under the Akhilesh Yadav dispensation.
A voter turnout of 60.19 per cent was recorded till 5 pm in the third phase of Lok Sabha elections in 93 constituencies spread over 11 states and Union Territories on Tuesday with sporadic incidents of violence in West Bengal.
The alliance leaders are getting together for the third round of the brainstorming session in Mumbai, after Patna and Bengaluru, to chalk out their common campaign strategy to take on the NDA in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Former district panchayat member Prem Yadav, 50, was attacked with sharp edged weapons and killed by his rival Satyaprakash Dubey and his family when he went to the latter's house. In retaliation, Yadav's supporters from Abhaipur attacked Dubey's house and killed Dubey and four of his family.
'He should not come to Kerala and fight against the CPI which is an integral part of the INDIA alliance'
Kumar's comment comes days after a section of JD-U leaders in Uttar Pradesh announced that they would join the Congress' 'Bharat Jodo Yatra' in the state.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday night sacked a junior minister and changed the portfolios of 11 ministers including 9 of cabinet rank in a major reshuffle of his council of ministers.
Top leaders of Opposition parties will brainstorm at a meeting in Patna on Friday to chalk out a roadmap for the formation of an anti-Bharatiya Janata Party front for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, with sources saying that they would look to avoid the prickly leadership question and emphasise on common ground.
In another major shakeup of the state's bureaucracy in four days, the Uttar Pradesh government on Tuesday transferred 36 Indian Administrative Services officers including district magistrates after a review of the law and order situation by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav.
Leaders of several like-minded opposition parties are likely to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Karnataka chief minister-designate Siddaramaiah and deputy chief minister D K Shivakumar on Saturday in Bengaluru.
The funeral of Captain Sathe, 58, who was a resident of Chandivali in Mumbai, will be held in Mumbai later in the day.
Shivpal-Yadav led Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia spokesperson Deepak Mishra said it was a courtesy call.
The Indian consulate in Dubai will remain open on Saturday to help those who need assistance to travel to Kerala and provide information about the crash of the Air India Express flight that skidded off a hilltop runway and split in two while landing in heavy rain at an airport in Kozhikode, killing at least 18 people.
