The Trinamool Congress registered a decisive victory in West Bengal on Sunday, contrary to results of most exit polls which predicted a tight race between the BJP and the TMC with an edge to the Mamata Banerjee-led party.
Helicopters are anticipated to be more in demand compared to fixed-wing aircraft as choppers will help in providing accessibility to rural and remote areas in a shorter time.
The Congress, which won assembly elections with a thumping majority to retain power in Assam, would not have even got a simple majority had the Asom Gana Parishad and the Bharatiya Janata Party cobbled up a pre-poll alliance. As per the election statistics, the Congress would have been defeated in at least 20 seats had the AGP and the BJP joined hands in fighting the polls in the north-eastern state.
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, Speaker Tanka Bahadur Rai, Deputy Speaker Pranati Phukon and a host of Cabinet ministers and Congress veterans are among the total 485 candidates whose fate will be decided on Monday in the first phase of the Assembly elections in Assam to be held in 62 Local Authorities Constituencies spread over 13 districts.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
A plea challenging the Election Commission's decision to conduct assembly elections over eight phases in West Bengal was filed in the Supreme Court on Monday.
Raijor Dal president Akhil Gogoi said on Thursday that his party has not accepted the Trinamool Congress's proposal of a merger as it does not want to compromise on its Assamese identity.
One of the high-profile contests in the high-stakes Bengal polls is likely to be a direct fight between Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her former confidant and now BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari in Nandigram seat.
Two person were killed and 20 others, including four police men, injured in a bomb blast near a temporary election office of BJP in Assam's Goalpara district.
The counting of votes will take place on November 2.
Gohain claimed that his discussions with Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma regarding the delimitation "did not bring any positive outcome".
Legislative assembly elections in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state are due next year.
With the first phase of Assembly elections in Assam slated for April 4, and the second phase on April 11, it appears that the ruling Congress is all set to stage a comeback under the leadership of Tarun Kumar Gogoi.
The Election Commission on Friday barred Sarma from campaigning for ongoing Assam elections for 48 hours for his remark against Bodoland People's Front Chairperson Hagrama Mohilary.
A video shows the Congress leader taking instructions from workers of the Sadhuru tea garden on how to pluck tea leaves. She smiles as a few others click photographs, the minute long video shows.
The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs took a decision to this effect in the wake of the scrapping of the IMDT Act by the Supreme Court.
From the word go, Bihar growled its needs out when an MP from the state said aloud: "Give something for Bihar also, Madam." Every time the Budget mentioned cities and towns in Andhra Pradesh, "Kursi Bachao" was the call from Congress MPs.
The repoll will be held from 7 am to 4 pm, the Election Commission said on Tuesday.
The results of the assembly elections in Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal are hours away and Dominic Xavier wonders if a fresh government battleplan to fight the COVID-19 pandemic will only materialise after the electoral outcome is known.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be on a two-day visit to the North East from Tuesday, during which he will attend the oath-taking ceremonies of new governments in three states of the region.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday named Union minister Narendra Singh Tomar and its general secretary Arun Singh as central observers for the election of the leader of its legislative party in Assam.
A home ministry spokesperson, however, said the decision does not imply that the AFSPA has been completely withdrawn from the three insurgency-hit states but will continue to be in force in some areas of the three states.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies are well on the way to power in two north-eastern states, and is almost certain to be part of the ruling dispensation in the third.
With assembly elections coming up in Assam and Bengal, the BJP election machine will go all out to woo MLAs from rival parties to its side. No one picks up MLAs better than Santa Shah, says Dominic Xavier.
BJP is set to win majority of 32 municipality boards and 42 town committees in Assam
Sangma will go to Raj Bhawan at 11:30 am on Friday and meet the governor to apprise him of the assembly election results, the official said.
The senior Congress leader opined that the situation in Assam can now be divided into two phases -- pre-CAA and post-CAA, and it was necessary to unite all anti-CAA forces in order to protect the ethos of the Assam Accord.
The poll panel has convened a press conference at 4.30 pm.
Amid the political blame game over Bengal's potato ban, which led to shortages in Jharkhand and Odisha, Uttar Pradesh farmers are the unlikely winners.
We are definite that we will form the government here," Sonowal told media persons.
Dominic Xavier offers his take on these quaint developments.
The expansion was the first by Sarma since he assumed chief ministership of the state about 13 months ago.
In Maharashtra, where the 'Mahayuti' alliance of BJP, Shiv Sena and smaller parties is against the 'Maha-agadhi' led by the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party whereas the ruling BJP is locked in a contest with the opposition Congress and the fledgling Jannayak Janata Party for the 90 assembly seats in Haryana.
Manik Saha was named as the next chief minister of the northeastern state of Tripura at a meeting of the Bharatiya Janata Party legislative party held in Agartala on Monday.
'Everything was sacrosanct when the BJP was led by Vajpayee and Advani.' 'That was a different culture. But with Modi and Amit Shah nothing is sacrosanct.'
The first election that the US and UK-trained Conrad Sangma, who now runs the National People's Party (NPP) formed by his father PA Sangma, fought in 2004 had resulted in a narrow defeat.
The BJP, however, denied the former three-time state chief minister's assertion on Ranjan Gogoi who was nominated as a Rajya Sabha member by the government in March.
Keeping an eye on the upcoming assembly elections, Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah on Wednesday promised the people of Assam that if his party comes to power it will put an end to unabated infiltration in the state from Bangladesh.
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