Much depends on the BJP's electoral performance in next year's assembly elections. If the party fares well in UP and some states like Goa and Gujarat, it will be able to fob off the attempt at a reappraisal of its Hindutva doctrine, observes Amulya Ganguli.
Indicating that India was in "safe hands" with the BJP, he said "You can protect the country if you accept the BJP's ideology."
The BJP believes that the only party still capable of leading a credible challenge against it is the Congress. Please note how BJP campaigners in states where the Congress may count for a cipher or thereabouts, mostly attack the Congress, observes Shekhar Gupta.
As many as 35 of 53 Nationalist Congress Party MLAs were present at the party meeting convened by Maharashtra deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar in Mumbai on Wednesday, party sources said.
If the protests have cemented the ties between the peasantry and the traders, the political implications for the BJP might become too serious to be disregarded because its core base was made up of the urban Khatri merchants.
'The finance minister has told the BJP's core voters we are hearing you and we are sensitive to your aspirations.'
Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday took a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over his reported remarks that BJP needs to bring dalits into its fold as nationalists were already with the party, wondering whether he did not consider dalits and backwards as nationalists.
Both the Shiv Senas - one of Maharashtra Chief minister Eknath Shinde and the other of Uddhav Thackeray - marked their foundation day on Monday, with attack on each other.
The Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) on Monday claimed Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar has failed to create a successor who could take his party forward.
'US officials must grapple with the possibility that one of its closest partners attempted an extrajudicial killing on its soil.' 'This is not something that friends typically do to friends.'
Interestingly, Kanal's crossover to Sena came on a day Aaditya Thackeray led a morcha against alleged scams and corruption in the Mumbai civic body.
Though largely seen as an official visit, with less than a year for elections, Shah during this trip is likely to meet senior party leaders including Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai, veteran leader B S Yediyurappa among others
Though the BJP is running too close for comfort, populist schemes and support among Muslims may help Mamata Banerjee overcome the challenge, observes Aditi Phadnis.
Joining hands with smaller parties with a political base in different castes was a part of the BJP strategy as it won big in Uttar Pradesh in the 2017 assembly polls and 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Rahstriya Swayamsevak Sangh ideologue S Gurumurthy, who was asked by the Sangh to probe charges against Bharatiya Janata Party president Nitin Gadkari, on Wednesday said he had found "no moral or legal wrongdoing" in Purti Group's funding and alleged that the media is giving the issue a political colour.
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Rahul met the prime minister for about 30 minutes before the party group chaired by Congress President Sonia Gandhi with the prime minister by her side began deliberations at Dr Singh's residence.
'Sri Ayodhyaji will emerge as the greatest centre of cultural togetherness, universal harmony, vasudeva kutumbakam, compassion, and love for every single living being on this Earth.'
BJP MP Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore alleged that the phone tapping of public representatives allegedly by CM Ashok Gehlot-led government has broken the trust of the people and extended an invite to all those with 'India first' ideology to join the BJP, fuelling speculations of Sachin Pilot joining the ruling party at the Centre.
The 21st Law Commission said the special status given to the entity of HUF was a 'so-called gift by the British', who could not comprehend the complex socioeconomic structure of Indian families. 'Now, this status is being used for the evasion of tax only,' it said.
Political observers are keen to see if the BJP will now be guided by its more firmly entrenched ideological dominance in picking a face solidly identified with its core planks, or if it will choose a person tilted more to its electoral calculations. Or, whether its pick will be an ode to its core supporters or a outreach to relatively new groups of votaries.
Tushar Dedha of the ABVP won the post of DUSU president, defeating NSUI's Hitesh Gulia by a margin of 3,115 votes. Dedha got 23,460 votes and Gulia 20,345.
The scam-ridden Congress government in Chhattisgarh has become a model of misrule and people have decided to root it out in the upcoming assembly elections, he said.
What the election demonstrated is that the BJP has a stranglehold on most of the Hindu votes in the Union territory, observes David Devadas.
'We have to change the Dravidian influence on the people.'
SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal announced the decision to snap ties with the NDA on Saturday night, amid stepped up agitation by farmers in Punjab over the three legislations which were recently passed by Parliament amid Opposition protests.
The Samajwadi Party is unwilling to cede ground to the BJP, especially in Amethi, since the Congress is too weak to counter the BJP's well-oiled election machinery.
'Tamil Nadu is a paradox. We have more places of Hindu worship per square kilometres than any other place in the world. 'We break more coconuts for religious reasons everyday than any other place in the world.' 'At the same time, we also have a very strong Periyar-infused movement of rationalism.'
Buckling under B S Yeddyurappa's pressure, Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday decided to replace Sadananda Gowda with Jagdish Shettar as the chief minister of Karnataka marking the third change in the state in four years. The decision was taken at the BJP core group meeting in New Delhi on Saturday, sources said.
'We all know that when the Babri Masjid was demolished, P V Narasimha Rao was prime minister.' 'He did not do anything to stop the demolition.'
While the Shinde-led Shiv Sena will organise its event at NESCO ground in Goregaon in northwest Mumbai, the Shiv Sena-UBT will hold its event in Shanmukhanand Hall at Sion in central Mumbai.
The Lok Sabha on Wednesday passed three bills to replace the colonial-era criminal laws by voice vote.
Our political history tells us this has never worked. A united Opposition does work in some specific, limited situations, especially in the states. But never as some brilliant pan-national collection of diverse interests with no ideological or political core, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
Gandhi said the govt "tried everything to stop" his 'Bharat Jodo Yatra', but nothing was working against the "effect" of the foot march.
The two oldest NDA allies insisted they did not want the alliance to come apart.
She has been losing her party's core voters since the 2007 assembly polls, whereas the Samajwadi Party has managed to keep its flock together. The BJP believes she is a soft target.
The prime minister was seen wearing a light blue "sadri" jacket as he sat in the Rajya Sabha in the morning.
Maharashtra BJP chief spokesperson Keshav Upadhye said there was no political angle to the meeting. "Raut wanted to interview Fadnavis for (the Sena mouthpiece) Saamana and this meeting was to discuss how to go about it," he tweeted.
He claimed that out of 90 secretaries of the government of India, only three are from the Other Backward Classes and control only five per cent of the Budget, which he said was an "insult" to the backward classes.
The senior leader also said that Jaitley was known and respected for his 'sharp, analytical mind and everyone in the BJP always depended on him for finding solutions to complex issues'.
The BJP MLC, who had switched his loyalty from the Janat Dal-Secular to the BJP two years ago, alleged that the "entire state" including ministers, had been talking about Vijayendra's interference in the administration.
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