The BJP was unable to win any seat in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala besides Puducherry in 2011.
'As we enter 2025, it must be acknowledged that there is a convergence of capital, influential people (from business and politics) and technology deciding the destiny of others in the name of pride, patriotism, nationalism, nation building, all of it thinly veiled disguises for personal profit and glory,' asserts Shyam G Menon.
If the Congress reached 90, it would have a pretty good chance of holding the BJP below the 272 mark. A hundred seats will rock national politics, argues Shekhar Gupta.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) is poised to form the first elected government in Jammu and Kashmir, having secured a victory in the assembly elections by securing 49 out of 90 seats on which polls were held for the first time since the abrogation of Article 370 five years ago.
Both Chandrababu Naidu and Pawan Kalyan assured voters that they would bring jobs and industrial development to the state. Their alliance batted for a welfare-plus-development model.
Seen by political watchers as the favourite to retain power for a third straight term, the Bharatiya Janata Party has set itself an ambitious target of winning 370 Lok Sabha seats, a goal aimed as much at projecting its strength as at diminishing the opposition in popular imagination.
'There are 7,000 guns which are in the hands of the armed militia of the Kuki and Meitei communities.'
Despite losing the Municipal Corporation of Delhi polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party fared well in trans-Yamuna areas, including northeast Delhi that was rocked by communal riots in 2020, but its performance took a hit in the city's northern and southern parts of the city, data showed.
'We pressurised him (to accept the deputy chief ministership).' 'Being out of power would have made him weaker.'
Despite failing to secure a simple majority in Parliament, we will continue to see him on TV, newspapers, magazines, bill boards, vaccination certificates, railway stations, bus shelters, airports, sea ports, on the highway and on rural roads, sighs A Ganesh Nadar.
'How can the voting percentage be higher than the actual polled votes?'
Among the BJP rebels, a notable figure is Gopal Shetty, a two-time MLA and former Lok Sabha member from Mumbai. He has filed his nomination as an independent candidate against the party's official nominee, Sanjay Upadhyay, in Mumbai's Borivali assembly constituency.
Loud music, bombastic action scenes, over-the-top dialogues that don't have any ring of truth to it followed by scenes of blood-oozing bodies floating in a river definitely don't make for a magnum opus!' exclaims Prasanna D Zore after watching the Chhaava trailer.
The ruling Mahayuti alliance in Maharashtra is heavily banking upon a six to 10 per cent shift in voters -- mostly women -- in its favour to return to power with anywhere between 160 and 170 assembly seats, say four MLAs belonging to Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena.
'One needs to understand what kind of means the BJP use to bring other party leaders in their party.' 'They are unscrupulous politicians and money plays an important role.'
Fissures surfaced among Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) partners ahead of the Jharkhand assembly elections as the Rashtriya Janata Dal on Saturday expressed disappointment over the announcement of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and Congress contesting 70 of 81 seats in the state.
When it comes to the Congress and Wayanad, the only way the scepticism in the minds of some in Kerala may be addressed is by the Gandhi family proving that they are more than a passing caravan in town, reports Shyam G Menon.
'Whenever the hike in voting percentage is more, the NDA gains more, and when the hike is negligible, the NDA falls.' 'I have established this in UP, Haryana and Jharkhand.'
'Saha had taken charge in a difficult time and led the party to a crucial victory in the election. He deserves to be the next Chief Minister'
Meanwhile, the Congress' data analytics department chairperson Praveen Chakravarty on Tuesday wrote to Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar, seeking assembly-wise voter rolls in excel sheet format for the Lok Sabha elections and the assembly polls in Maharashtra.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister and Nationalist Congress Party head Ajit Pawar on Monday said discussions were underway among the Mahayuti partners to finalise a formula for the new government formation in the state.
While the Aam Aadmi Party is contesting on four seats, the Congress has fielded candidates for the remaining three seats.
'We will win all the 28 Lok Sabha seats in 2024.'
As Rose Valley resurfaces, Sudip Bandyopadhyay and Tapas Pal's arrests marks the end of the bonhomie between the TMC and BJP.
The BJP stormed back to power in the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh, trouncing its main rival SP, with Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath asserting that people have buried the politics of caste and religion.
If the idea was to garner AIADMK votes with or without the three faction leaders after the party broke ties with the NDA, it may not work after all, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among the 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday while Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27.
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar appear to have got the maximum representation in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's new council of ministers, while assembly poll-bound Maharashtra also found a significant presence.
How many more years, how many more states, how many more campaigns, how many more candidates can he ask votes for, before he or the voters or both tire?, asks Krishna Prasad.
The Congress on Tuesday said it cannot accept the Haryana assembly polls verdict as there were 'serious issues' about the integrity of the counting process and functioning of the EVMs in some districts, and asserted that it would take up the matter with the Election Commission.
Navigating a history of animosity and mistrust, negotiations for a potential Congress-Trinamool Congress alliance in West Bengal face significant challenges while addressing the shared adversary of the Bharatiya Janata Party, with the Bengal Congress unit appearing reluctant to engage in an electoral pact.
The respective Dussehra rallies of Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and and Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray chief Uddhav Thackeray were once again about whose version of Hindutva is genuine and who is the true inheritor of party patriarch Bala Thackeray's legacy.
The widely expected development underlines the party's preference for continuity as it gears up for the all-important Lok Sabha polls next year, expected in April-May.
Sukanta Majumdar, the state BJP president, said, "Amit Shah has set a target of 35 seats. We will achieve that".
'Siddaramaiah was openly taking on the BJP's communal agenda, which very few non-BJP politicians do.'
'Suddenly we had a new comprehension of affairs, which reminded that the luxury of politics floated atop a foundation by economics.' 'Along with this, finance ministers became crucial in molding the perception and reputation of Union Cabinets.' 'Governments couldn't afford a wrong person in that portfolio,' asserts Shyam G Menon.
RJD president Lalu Prasad's daughter Rohini Acharya has entered the fray to wrest back her father's erstwhile pocket borough.
Modi and Chouhan have visited Mahakoshal multiple times and reached out to tribals to shore up support for the BJP.
Notwithstanding protests by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, he said the first session of the newly elected Jammu and Kashmir Assembly is "short in duration but historic in terms of agenda".
Gujarat was labelled Hindutva's crucible and Modi was to become the chief 'chemist'. A revealing political saga excerpted from Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay's The Demolition, the Verdict and the Temple: The Definitive Book on the Ram Mandir Project.
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