All the 568 cadres of the United Peoples Democratic Solidarity, a Karbi tribal militant group, laid down arms at a function held at Diphu in Karbi Anglong district in the presence of Assam's Director General of Police Shankar Baruah and Lieutenant General Shakti Gurung on Wednesday morning. The en masse surrender of weapons by the UPDS was held in the wake of a memorandum of settlement signed by the outfit with the government on November 25.
'The Congress will never change its ideology, but to fight this new kind of propaganda politics, we have to prepare ourselves.'
The SIT has been constituted and has been directed to complete the probe within a month, Shah said.
Paresh Barua, the fugitive 'commander-in-chief' of the anti-talks faction of the United Liberation Front of Assam, has been reportedly spotted by Indian security agencies at various locations in China.
Former chief of the Intelligence Bureau P C Haldar will be the interlocutor between the government and the proscribed United Liberation Front of Assam if a peace process is initiated with the outfit, given the positive signals emanating from its ranks.
'There is little appetite in the Democratic foreign policy establishment to pick a fight with India.'
Anup Chetia, who is now lodged at the Guwahati Central Jail, said that he wanted to join the pro-talks faction of the ULFA.
'Parties which supported me were all threatened. This could hardly have been called a fair election.' 'This is Modi's India.'
Congress workers must feel what their BJP counterparts did in 2009, but that could change.
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Wednesday called upon the Central government to involve ULFA general secretary Anup Chetia in the on-going peace talks.
'Bangladeshi Muslims want to increase their population in India.' 'They have made colonies in India.' 'Rohingyas are doing the same.' 'This has to stop.'
ULFA's fugitive chairman, Arabinda Rajkhowa, stated, "We call upon the entire people of our region to boycott and prevent the celebration, in any manner, of India's Independence Day in our Region on 15 August 2008 to consolidate our solidarity in the struggle for liberation from Indian colonial occupation. On this day, a general strike shall be observed throughout the Region from 01:00 am to 6:00 pm.
The seats identified are from Odisha, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and the Northeast.
The AFSPA will continue to remain in force in 12 districts of Arunachal Pradesh for six more months.
'Modi swept the 2014 elections for two main reasons: First, the disgust with the Congress government with a non-functional prime minister, and second, more importantly, his promise of performance and hope.' 'He cannot expect to win 2019 on these planks again. His own success in finishing the Congress will take away one plank, and with five years of reign on his CV, he will need to flaunt performance more than promise.'
Even if they score administratively, state governments ruled by the party suffer from an inability to communicate positively, say observers.
Cross-voting by Left and Congress MLAs on Friday helped Trinamool Congress gain an extra seat in West Bengal while a similar action by Congress MLAs in Andhra Pradesh saw the Telangana Rashtra Samithi making its debut in Rajya Sabha as high drama marked the polls to the upper House in the two states.
Speaking to around 60 journalists in three different sittings, the Congress vice-president, who is known to be media shy when it comes to his personal life, has opened up on a range of topics.
The Congress's share has almost halved, down from 12 in 2014 to six now.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
The reshuffle had politics at its heart, so the biggest complement of new ministers, both Cabinet rank and below, came from UP, which will see assembly elections in a few months.
In bad news for security forces, Bodo insurgent group NDFB-S is believed to have aligned with UNLFW, an umbrella organisation of terror groups in the north-east, responsible for the recent ambush in Manipur that killed 18 soldiers.
Indian intelligence agencies have often claimed that left-wing extremists are trying to make inroads in the militancy-hit regions of north-east to foment further unrest. But Jaideep Saikia, noted terrorism and conflict analyst, claims, "People who speak of Maoism taking roots in the north-east have not read history".
Party said it will take action against Sharad Yadav if he attends Lalu Yadav's August 27 rally.
'Bharat Ratna and longest bridges, while necessary, will not promote the peace and prosperity of the citizens of India. Only just popular laws and foresight on the part of the leadership will'
The newly-formed common forum of Northeast insurgent groups based in Myanmar has posed a renewed threat to security and peace in the troubled region.
The last leg of poll campaign saw many national leaders canvassing for their parties.
India is the birthplace of four major world religions -- Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, and Jainism. It is home to the world's third largest Muslim population, a diverse community of sects that includes Sufis, Shia, and Bohra. Roughly three per cent of India's citizens are Christian, and notably, Christians are the religious majority in three of India's 29 states, she said.
Complaints of electronic voting machine malfunctioning poured in from several booths on Tuesday during the third and largest phase of Lok Sabha polls which saw voters turning out in large numbers to cast their vote in 116 seats, including all constituencies of Gujarat and Kerala.
Nationalist Socialist Council of Nagaland-Issac-Munivah wanted to join the operations against NSCN-K militants.
A blast in New Jaipaiguri in West Bengal has killed four persons and injured seven. The police and the Intelligence Bureau are suspecting the involvement of the dreaded Inter-Services Intelligence funded, Kamtapur Liberation Organisation. The powerful bomb was planted on a cycle.
The venue holds significance as the announcement of Nagaland's statehood on December 1, 1963 was made from Kohima by the then president Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan.
The Bharatiya Janata Party appeared to cede ground in Uttar Pradesh where Samajwadi Party was leading on six of the 11 Assembly seats where bypolls were held while it was neck and neck with Congress in Gujarat and behind in Rajasthan, exactly four months after it swept the three states in Lok Sabha elections.
Counting of votes will be held on Thursday for 51 assembly seats and two Lok Sabha constituencies spread across 18 states where by-elections were held two days ago.
It is time he stood up and assured the middle class that they can count on him as one of their own, says Dr Sudhir Bisht.
Shah said the government was committed to ensure development in the country.
'The CAA should be kept in abeyance, without making it a prestige issue.'
'Laying down a clear policy on the future of illegal migrants will dispel anxieties and help in implementing the CAA, NPR and also the NCR,' suggests former Union home secretary Dr Madhav Godbole.
RJD chief Lalu Prasad and other leaders claimed the countdown for the ouster of the BJP and its allies from power in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls had begun.
'Oommen Chandy may well prove to be the Teflon chief minister whose reputation cannot be tarnished,' predicts Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
Kumar's comments at the party's national executive meeting came amid a strain in his ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party and appears to be a message to his ally, some of whose leaders have been linked to alleged communal tensions and violence in the state.
