West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee, who heads the All India Trinamool Yuva, on Monday denied suggestions that the newly formed national platform for youths followed Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's example to woo youths.
A total of 78 Muslims were in the fray in the Lok Sabha elections this year, a significant drop from the last polls when 115 Muslim candidates were fielded by various parties.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday took oath as member of the 18th Lok Sabha.
'...still have lost the 2014 Lok Sabha polls but could have won 140 seats.'
The West Bengal assembly on Tuesday turned into a virtual battlefield with the ruling Trinamool Congress and Opposition Communist Party of India-Marxist members scuffling and trading blows resulting in injuries to three MLAs, with the Speaker suspending three Marxist members for the rest of the short winter session.
Bose, who also owns the popular Bengali daily Pratidin, once employed the suspended Trinamool Rajya Sabha member Kunal Ghosh, now behind bars for his alleged role in Saradha affairs, as editor of the newspaper.
The Congress 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra', led by Rahul Gandhi, is scheduled to enter West Bengal from Assam on Thursday, amid political ripples within the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) in the state.
The leaders of the Opposition INDIA bloc are meeting on Monday morning ostensibly to redraw their strategies to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led BJP both inside the Parliament and in the electoral arena.
Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee will not be part of the virtual meeting on Saturday morning as she is preoccupied with prior engagements, they said.
Trinamool Congress Monday said Left's failure to support a no confidence motion to be brought by it in winter session will mean that their opposition to FDI in multi-brand retail "is false and sham" and voiced hope that all parties would come on board.
The bypolls are considered to be important ahead of the assembly elections in 2016.
Opposition parties on Tuesday decried the GJM for raising the Gorkhaland demand before Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at a government programme, with the Communist Party of India-Marxist accusing the Trinamool Congress of having created a 'Frankenstein'.
The Supreme Court of India has invalidated the appointment of 25,753 teachers and other staff in West Bengal's state-run and state-aided schools, deeming the selection process "vitiated and tainted." The court ordered the state government to conduct a fresh selection process within three months. The decision comes after a Calcutta High Court verdict in April 2024, which also annulled the appointments. The apex court, while upholding the high court's order, made some modifications, including exempting disabled employees from returning their salaries. The case stemmed from alleged irregularities in the 2016 recruitment process by the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC), involving OMR sheet tampering and rank-jumping. The Supreme Court had previously termed it a "systemic fraud." Former West Bengal education minister Partha Chatterjee and Trinamool Congress MLAs Manik Bhattacharya and Jiban Krishna Saha are among the accused being investigated in the recruitment scam.
Banerjee, who was speaking to reporters at West Bengal's state secretariat, said that her party's name will remain the All India Trinamool Congress.
"The NIA categorically refuted allegations of mala fide in its Bhupatinagar blast case," an agency spokesperson said.
In a press conference later in the day Sangma said that any resolution that is decided upon should be acceptable to the people.
In a veiled reference to West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee, state Congress president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said he cannot speak in favour of someone who wants to finish him politically and his party in the state.
'Mamata will beat the living daylights out of BJP workers with the result that people who are not totally committed, they will promptly leave the party and go back to Trinamool.' 'Or when they find they cannot get what they came to the BJP for they will go back to Trinamool.'
Healthcare services remained affected at state-run hospitals in West Bengal as junior doctors continued their cease-work protest.
Leaders of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) have decided to raise the NEET issue in both houses of Parliament on Friday and members will give notices in this regard, sources have said.
Among the national parties, the Congress, Aam Aadmi Party, the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Communist Party of India-Marxist opposed the proposal, while the Bharatiya Janata Party and the National People's Party supported it.
Addressing a protest rally at Bankura against rising fuel prices and the proposed privatisation of trains on Saturday, Kalyan Banerjee demanded Sitharaman's resignation.
Earlier, the party's members of Parliament had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for removing Mehta over his reported meeting with West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party leader Suvendu Adhikari.
In West Bengal's Howrah two women from a family were allegedly gang-raped by seven men, who reportedly have links with Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress.
The BJP, which has emerged as the main opposition party in West Bengal after winning 77 seats in the assembly polls last year, failed to win even a single civic body.
"This is the minimum expectation at this time of national tragedy," she said.
Virtually rejecting Trinamool Congress' appeal to support a no-confidence motion to be brought by it, Communist Party of India-Marxist said such a move would only help the government cover up all its "wrong" policies.
After West Bengal Governor C V Ananda Bose refused to concede to their request that their swearing-in be held in the assembly, two newly elected Trinamool Congress legislators held a protest on Wednesday on the assembly premises.
Modi addressed scientists at the Indian Space Research Organisation command centre in Bengaluru, who were involved in the Chandrayaan-3 mission and lauded them for their efforts.
The parliamentary committee scrutinizing the Waqf (Amendment) Bill has been granted an extension until the last day of the next Budget Session. This decision follows a heated meeting marked by a walkout from opposition members who expressed concerns about the committee's draft report. The committee will visit several states to meet stakeholders and finalize its report.
The Trinamool Congress on Wednesday blamed the Communist Party of India-Marxist for the violence at Bamunghata in South 24 Parganas district with a party minister saying that the Marxist party would not have existed had not the TMC given a call for change.
Lok Sabha constituencies that sprung a surprise in the 2024 polls.
Banerjee said she will not allow implementation of the CAA, the NRC and the Uniform Civil Code in the state.
During the Zero Hour of the Lok Sabha, BJP MP Anurag Thakur tried to corner the Leader of Opposition and Congress MP, Rahul Gandhi, by alleging that he has not spoken about ensuring the safety of minorities in Bangladesh.
Bypolls will be held on Wednesday in 31 assembly seats spread across 10 states and Kerala's Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency, from where Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is making her electoral debut. Though these bye-elections are not going to have any bearing on the governments, they are seen as a big test for the Congress and the INDIA bloc which failed to put up a united show in the recent Haryana assembly polls. Most of these seats fell vacant after the sitting MLAs contested the Lok Sabha elections and won while in some constituencies, the bypolls are being held due to death of the representatives. The Wayanad seat was vacated by Rahul Gandhi, who also won from the Rae Bareli parliamentary constituency which he kept. Voting will be held in seven seats in Rajasthan, six in West Bengal, five in Assam, four seats in Bihar, three in Karnataka, two seats in Madhya Pradesh, and one seat each in Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Kerala and Meghalaya. Votes will be counted on November 23.
Chowdhury said the schedule of the yatra was submitted to the state administration long ago.
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), led by Arvind Kejriwal, suffered a major setback in the Delhi Assembly elections, losing to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The loss marks a significant blow to Kejriwal's national ambitions and raises questions about the future of the party. The AAP had been in power in Delhi for the past 10 years and had also formed a government in Punjab. Despite the defeat, the party still holds 13 MPs from Punjab and Delhi. The article examines the factors that contributed to the AAP's defeat, including allegations of corruption, poor civic facilities, and the BJP's relentless attacks. It also explores the impact of the loss on Kejriwal's national aspirations and the party's future.
A group of MPs from the opposition alliance INDIA will visit Manipur on July 29 and 30 to assess the situation in the northeastern state which has been engulfed in ethnic violence since May 3.
'The BJP will get the lion's share of the Opposition vote. I would give the Congress-Left around 15 per cent.'
According to sources, Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, Anand Sharma and Jairam Ramesh reached out to other Opposition leaders for the boycott of the event.
