Voting will be held on Thursday in bypolls to seven assembly seats in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
Tribals constitute 7-8 per cent of the state's population, and are a deciding factor in 47 assembly seats and seven Lok Sabha constituencies spread across the Junglemahal districts of Purulia, Paschim Medinipur, Bankura and Jhargram in southern Bengal and Jalpaiguri and Alipurduar in the north.
Jha will contest against National democratic Alliance's nominee Harivansh of the Janata Dal-United.
The power infrastructure and the farm sector have also suffered a considerable damage, Chief Secretary A K Tripathy said. However officials said the telecom infrastructure is largely intact.
'Unless India ups the ante, Beijing will continue to believe its transgressions are cost free and will feel encouraged to do more of the same.'
The ongoing Puri heritage corridor construction work might have caused damage to the 800-year-old Jagannath temple there and the state government project was being carried out without valid permission from the competent authorities, the Archaeological Survey of India on Monday informed the Orissa high court.
The idols of Lord Ganesh, the god of prosperity and wisdom and a slayer of obstacles ('vighna-harta'), will be installed in homes across the state with pomp and gaiety.
In his three-page-long resignation letter to party president and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik, he wrote, "It is with deep anguish, hurt and sorrow that I have decided to quit the kind of politics into which our BJD has descended."
'Gehlot is right now doing things, which are not appreciated by the Gandhis.' 'The Gandhis have realised that their writ does not run in Rajasthan, therefore they have deflected the issue to Kharge.'
The decision of some key regional parties like the Biju Janata Dal, the Telangana Rashtra Samiti and the Aam Aadmi Party to skip a key opposition meet called by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on the presidential poll has cheered the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party as it believes that their absence has only highlighted the faultlines and one-upmanship among its rivals.
President Droupadi Murmu administered him the oath at a brief ceremony held at the Rashtrapati Bhavan.
If there is unity in the Opposition, it is only about regional parties other than the DMK not wanting Rahul Gandhi or any other Congress leader for prime minister, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
However, organisations such as the Missionaries of Charity will not be eligible for the extension benefits as their applications for a renewal of the FCRA registration have already been rejected, according to a notice issued by the ministry of home affairs.
The latest trend issued by the State Election Commission showed the BJD had already won or was leading in 762 Zilla Parishad seats, as compared to BJP's 46 and Congress's 36 seats.
The Congress may stand a better chance in the assembly polls if it followed the 'Himachal model', suggests N Sathiya Moorthy.
Regional films may have prevailed over the country, but regional leaders still have far mountains to climb to reach Delhi, asserts Shreekant Sambrani.
Earlier, it was reported that the judges of the apex court would get the option to choose between Covaxin or Covishield vaccines. Later, the Union health ministry, in a clarification, said the judges have not been given any such option to choose between both the vaccines, adding that it will be conducted entirely through Co-Win system.
The group, comprising on 147 women and 20 men, were airlifted by an Air Asia chartered flight from Kochi to the Biju Patnaik International Airport in Bhubaneswar.
The airport issued a notice to airmen on Tuesday to alert airlines that its flight operations will be suspended from 11 pm to 5 am on Thursday.
The NDA's combined parliamentary and state-level committed Presidential votes number around 12,000 fewer than a majority.
At least 34 people were killed during Cyclone Fani, which barrelled through coastal Odisha on Friday last, causing widespread destruction and leaving hundreds grappling with water shortage and power cut.
Birsa Munda International Hockey Stadium in Sundargarh district will be packed to the rafters during the FIH Men's Hockey World Cup.
A day after Cyclone Yaas tore through coastal Odisha and Bengal to cause havoc as far as Jharkhand, tornadoes, torrential rains, bridge collapses and swelling rivers continued to plague eastern India as people tried to pick up their lives amid the debris of swept away mud homes and swamped farmlands.
The two-page booklet "Aama Bapuji: Eka Jhalaka" (Our Bapuji: A Glimpse) -- published on the occasion of 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi -- presents a brief account of his teachings, works and links with Odisha, while also stating that he "died due to accidental reasons in a sudden sequence of events on January 30, 1948 at Delhi's Birla House".
The NSA visited the affected northeastern parts of Delhi, including Jaffrabad and Seelampur, where he met police officers and gave them necessary directives, besides meeting leaders of different communities to assuage the tensed situation, the officials said.
Chants of 'Jai Jagannath' rent the air all over as the news about the Supreme Court giving its nod for holding the world famous car festival in the pilgrim town reached the state bringing cheers among people, irrespective of caste, creed and religion.
'The government is using the agencies of the government to suppress the Opposition.'
Teenaged Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa, who stunned Magnus Carlsen in the eighth round of the Airthings Masters online rapid chess tournament, was delighted, yet modest in his moment of triumph, saying he just wanted to enjoy playing against the world No. 1.
Lakra, who will soon join a private airline as a co-pilot, has achieved this feat after years of hard work.
On its own or with allies the Congress has a strong presence in states that account for a total of 253 LS seats, or 20 short of the magic figure of 272 required to form a government at the Centre. So what is Mamata Banerjee talking about, asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
The extremely severe cyclonic storm, which made landfall at Puri on Friday, unleashed copious rain and windstorm that gusted up to 200 kmph, blowing away thatched roofs of houses, swamped towns and villages, before weakening and entering West Bengal
The inquiry by will not deal with the allegations of sexual harassment against the CJI.
A day after the Congress's second straight defeat in the national election, resignations were flying.
What these elections prove beyond any doubt (if ever there was one) that Modi's hold over public mind and Shah's mastery of election management are unparalleled. It doesn't seem likely that they will be matched any time soon in the Indian political scene, reaffirms Shreekant Sambrani.
Seeking to dispel confusion over the shifting of Posco plant in Orissa, the state government on Thursday asserted that the Rs 51,000 crore (Rs 510 billion) project of the South Korean steel giant would come up at its proposed site only, near Paradip.
The tribal leader, India's youngest president at 64 and the first to be born after Independence, took oath of office in the name of god to 'preserve, protect and defend the Constitution and the law'.
The quick reaction surface-to-air-missile missile developed by DRDO was test launched from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur near here at about 3.08 pm from a vertical launcher against an electronic target at a very low altitude.
Declaring that the Prime Ministerial candidate of the Third Front would be decided after the elections, Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati hosted a dinner for the leaders of the grouping and resolved to defeat the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance and the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Deomocratic Alliance.
From trusted bureaucrat, to Wharton, MNC executive to businessman, and now politician, the man in charge of two weighty ministries is a unique all-rounder with specialist knowledge.
'We had never imagined that the prime minister could use such language to win votes.' 'I was under the impression that the prime minister is a very knowledgeable man, but I was amazed to find that he doesn't know that India's Constitution.'
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