In a setback for the ruling Trinamool Congress in West Bengal, the exit polls on Saturday predicted that the Bharatiya Janata Party will move ahead of Mamata Banerjee's party in the Lok Sabha elections in the state.
The meeting was attended by CMs of Kerala, Punjab and Telangana -- Pinarayi Vijayan, Bhagwant Manna and A Revanth Reddy, Karnataka deputy CM DK Shivakumar, and senior BRS leader KT Ramarao among others.
The standoff between the government and the opposition in Parliament has showed no signs of easing after it erupted on the opening day of the Monsoon session on July 19.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) could have performed better in the recently-held Lok Sabha polls and perhaps, too much time was spent in reaching seat-sharing agreements, Communist Party of India-Marxist-Leninist Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya has said.
The BJP knows how to play with people's lives and bodies, former Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi said.
After the BRS lost the assembly elections recently, a number of its leaders quit the party to join the BJP or the Congress, which is in power in the state now.
Some have been cherry-picked to assert the BJP's supremacy over its allies or, significantly, its leaders who charted an independent course in the recent past.
An FIR has been lodged against 10 named and 200 unidentified individuals in connection with a clash and stone-pelting incident during a religious procession in Jharkhand's Hazaribag. The clash, involving two communities, broke out over the playing of an objectionable song. Police fired two rounds into the air to control the situation. The incident led to uproarious scenes in the Jharkhand Assembly with BJP MLAs demanding action against the perpetrators.
As part of the protest, BJP workers burned tyres, blocked roads, and closed shops in Nandigram, alleging that Trinamool Congress-backed criminals were responsible for the killing of Rathibala Arhi, a saffron party worker in Sonachura village.
Sinha said that he was not invited for "any party events, rallies or organizational meetings".
On the day of polling in the high-profile Chhindwara Lok Sabha seat in Madhya Pradesh on Friday, the city's mayor Vikram Ahake, who recently joined the Bharatiya Janata Party, urged people to vote for Congress' Nakul Nath.
Jitin Prasada was once considered as among Rahul Gandhi's 'young Turks' and was a minister in successive Manmohan Singh governments but defected from the Congress to the BJP in 2021, where he has again established himself as a prominent Brahmin face of Uttar Pradesh.
Sniping at the BJP senior leadership has reached a new high in Karnataka. For the moment, there is a truce, but the party knows the damage it could do ahead of the polls.
A sitting MLA and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate allegedly broke an electronic voting machine (EVM) and attacked a polling officer inside a booth during voting in Odisha which recorded a voter turnout of over 60.97 per cent in six Lok Sabha seats and 42 assembly segments, officials said.
Opposition MPs, some of whom have given their dissent, slammed the exercise as undemocratic, claiming that they were given little time to study the final report and frame their dissent notes.
Given the possibilities that next year's assembly elections could throw up, Stalin told the state assembly that an interim report had to be submitted by January 2026. The outcomes may well find its way into the DMK's poll manifesto, thus seeking to keep the electoral focus still on the BJP-ruled Centre and Prime Minister Modi, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Whether AAP bounces back or fades into political oblivion will depend on its strategy in the coming months.
The bill seeks to reserve one-third of all seats for women in the Lok Sabha and the state legislative assemblies.
Amid parties accusing rivals of promoting dynastic politics, the November 20 Maharashtra assembly polls will see brothers, cousins and father-children in the fray, with members of the same family taking on each other in some seats.
Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra's expulsion from the Lok Sabha triggered a political slugfest on Friday, with the opposition calling it a 'betrayal of India's parliamentary democracy' and the Bharatiya Janata Party asserting that it was an 'apt decision' as there was proof of the allegations levelled against her.
In a major upset in the Faizabad parliamentary constituency, where the temple town of Ayodhya is situated, Samajwadi Party candidate Awadhesh Prasad defeated sitting Bharatiya Janata Party MP Lallu Singh by a margin of 54,567 votes.
Buch, under a cloud over allegations of conflict of interest levelled by United States-based short-seller Hindenburg, was asked to appear before the PAC, which is reviewing the performance of the market regulator.
The saffron party had realised after the first phase of the elections that it was "on the backfoot," Pilot said.
A parliamentary panel has asked the Information and Broadcasting Ministry to submit a note on amendments needed in existing laws to clamp down on controversial content like the one involving YouTuber Ranveer Allahbadia. Members from different parties voiced concern over Allahbadia's crass comments at a YouTube programme and called for stringent measures to punish him and to ensure that such an incident does not recur. The committee's chairperson and BJP MP Nishikant Dubey shared their concerns at the meeting attended by Information and Broadcasting Secretary Sanjay Jaju and other senior ministry officials.
This is to counter allegations by the Opposition that the BJP had tipped off some of its own leaders about note ban.
As part of government's efforts to ensure better coordination with the party, Finance and Defence Minister Arun Jaitley will chair a meeting of its leaders and ministers every Monday.
If Meena resigns, it is likely to put pressure on other ministers whose areas also saw poor performance in the general elections.
'The Opposition parties will continue to woo Chandrababu Naidu even though he has said he will support the BJP.'
Veteran Bharatiya Janata Party leader stepped down from the position of leader of opposition from Lok Sabha on Friday and handed over the reins to his successor Sushma Swaraj, who had been the party's deputy leader in Lok Sabha.
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The top brass of the Bharatiya Janata Party, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, met in New Delhi on Wednesday.
"We have not taken a decision. BJP follows a procedure. You will be informed accordingly," Singh said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party leadership in Himachal Pradesh is making efforts to mollify party leaders who are disgruntled over distribution of tickets to six Congress rebels for the assembly bypolls, former chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said on Tuesday.
The DMK protested in the Lok Sabha after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan criticized the Tamil Nadu government for refusing to implement the National Education Policy (NEP) and accused them of "politics." Pradhan alleged that the state had initially agreed to the PM SHRI scheme but later backed out. The DMK, however, asserted that they have issues with the NEP and the three-language formula, and cannot accept it in full. The protests disrupted House proceedings, leading to an adjournment. The DMK members were angered by Pradhan's accusations, demanding the release of funds allocated for education in the state.
Noting that the assembly election results being very disappointing is an understatement, the Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson urged party MPs to channel their disappointment into positivity for next year's general elections.
Even non-partisan observers are saying the Congress and INDI alliance are not making any significant effort to campaign on the ground, he said.
'Muslims in Bihar under Nitishji's rule are safest than anywhere else.'
The development comes a day after a government resolution (GR) was issued, in which the state administration ordered disbursal of Rs 10 crore funds for strengthening the state Waqf Board.
The Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2025 was passed in the Lok Sabha early Thursday, with 288 members supporting it and 232 against it.
Two-time chief minister and five-time MLA Janata Dal-Secular leader H D Kumaraswamy has once again demonstrated his political acumen by bagging a seat in the union council of ministers, despite his party joining the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance just last year.
