Abstention by the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Telangana Rashtra Samithi also helped the government get its legislation through in the upper house where the ruling party does not enjoy a majority.
In a jolt to the Bharatiya Janata Party, its candidate on Thursday lost the mayoral election in the Jalgaon Municipal Corporation as 27 party corporators cross-voted.
As the Opposition held its first meeting on the Presidential polls and names of Farooq Abdullah and Gopalkrishna Gandhi also cropped up, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party reached out to several parties across the political spectrum to build a consensus choice with senior party leader and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh speaking to Sharad Pawar, Mallikarjun Kharge (Congress), Mamata Banerjee (Trinamool Congress), Akhilesh Yadav (Samajwadi Party) and Naveen Patnaik (Biju Janata Dal).
These are the 25 seats to watch out for as Gujarat goes to the polls over two phases on December 1 and 5.
The Aam Aadmi Party, which entered the fray with much fanfare, failed to make any impact at the hustings.
Leaders of a number of opposition parties on Tuesday met twice after which they decided to put up a united fight for the post.
Nearly 4,800 elected MPs and MLAs will vote on Monday to elect the 15th President of India, with National Democratic Alliance candidate Droupadi Murmu having a clear edge over Opposition's Yashwant Sinha as over 60 per cent votes are expected to be cast in her favour.
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.
Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar on Saturday said he is not completely opposed to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into the charges against the Adani group, but a Supreme Court committee will be more useful and effective.
An inchoate anger is brewing within the party against the central leadership after the poor show in the assembly polls.
Donations from corporates to the national parties increased by 109 per cent between FY 2017-18 and 2018-19, said an analysis by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), an NGO working for bringing in transparency in electoral politics.
Even though MLAs are required to show their ballot to respective party whips before casting their vote, all parties have ensured their MLAs are housed in five star hotels closer to the Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha where voting will take place on June 10.
The Congress, which is the single-largest party with 16 MLAs, has already staked claim to form the government in the coastal state.
The parties that have submitted the notice include the Congress, All India Trinamool Congress, Samajwadi Party, Telangana Rashtra Samithi, Communist Party of India, Communist Party of India-Marxist, Nationalist Congress Party, Rashtriya Janata Dal, National Conference, Dravida Munnetra Kazagham and the Aam Aadmi Party.
At least four FIRs related to extortion were registered against Singh in Mumbai and adjoining Thane.
The Congress on Thursday secured a seat in the present Bengal assembly as its candidate Bayron Biswas won the Sagardighi bypoll, defeating the nearest rival of the Trinamool Congress by 22,980 votes.
Most exit polls have predicted a clear victory for the BJP both in Maharashtra and in Haryana, even though they have differed in their projection on the number of seats.
"NDA is a beautiful rainbow of regional aspirations... So nation's development through the development of states... At a time when we are working for a developed India, NDA is taking the lead in showing the spirit of sabka prayas," he said.
Congress leaders were in for a rude shock on Monday when the media sidelined their much-touted Jawaharlal Nehru birth anniversary event, and instead turned its full attention to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was addressing thousands of supporters in Sydney's Allphones Arena
The Congress is planning to call a meeting of Opposition parties in May. It is possible to keep all possibilities open in case Karnataka yields a hung House, leading to a recalibrated Opposition.
Congress workers must feel what their BJP counterparts did in 2009, but that could change.
The Congress expressed its 'whole-hearted' support to the 'Bharat bandh' called by farmer unions against the new agri-marketing laws and announced that it will hold protests that day at all district and state headquarters in solidarity with the demands of the farmers. TRS president and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao said the party rank and file would actively participate in the bandh to ensure it was a success.
Bypolls in three assembly constituencies in as many states passed off peacefully on Monday with around over 70 per cent voter turnout, though some technical glitches in electronic voting machine were reported in Tamil Nadu and the ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal alleged that the Central Reserve Police Force was "influencing" voters.
What would Parliament be without these nine ladies?
Marking a vertical split in the Nationalist Congress Party, its senior leader Ajit Pawar joined the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government as deputy chief minister on Sunday.
After 47 years in electoral politics, Union minister Sharad Pawar on Monday became a member of the Rajya Sabha for the first time.
The overall productivity of the House for the first three weeks of the monsoon session has been 22.60 per cent," sources said
Both the BJP and the Congress have banked on new and young faces, some of whom have been nominated by the parties for the first time.
In a discussion in Lok Sabha on the COVID pandemic, members called for ban on international flights in view of the outbreak of the Omicron strain and demanded that the government 'accept responsibility' for deaths of lakhs of people during the outbreak.
Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari has tested positive for Covid-19.
NCP spokesperson and Maharashtra minister Nawab Malik said that AICC general secretary H K Patil was told about this scheduled meeting when he and other Congress leaders met Pawar in Mumbai recently.
The two leaders also discussed the special category status promised to the southern state.
The bill bars commercial surrogacy and allows the process only by close relatives for "altruistic" reasons.
Senior state BJP leaders Eknath Khadse and Pankaja Munde don't find a place in the list, which instead has lesser-known faces like Gopichand Padalkar, Praveen Datke and Ajit Gopchhade.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said the Bharatiya Janata Party has decided it would not adopt the path of appeasement and vote bank politics.
'It is mind-boggling that a party can be in rigor mortis even after numerous electoral defeats,' observes Ramesh Menon.
Joshi, however, clarified that he did not support the banned practice and that his remarks were on the tradition of 'Jauhar'.
Over 400 incumbent Lok Sabha members including Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, Lal Krishna Advani and Rajnath Singh have not yet declared their assets and liability details, according to an RTI reply.
While the BJP and ally Shiv Sena are yet to announce the seat-sharing pact for the polls, scheduled on October 21, the Amit Shah-led party believes it will be back to power with a thumping majority.
In renaming TRS and repositioning it as a 'national' party, KCR is also eyeing a pole position in opposition politics ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
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