The BJP, which won the Samajwadi Party strongholds of Rampur and Azamgarh in 2022 bypolls, hopes to wrest Mainpuri too.
The withdrawal of the candidature by DPAP leaders on the last day on August 30 is seen as a boost to the NC-Congress alliance.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Sunday suspended party MLA Rama Bai for supporting the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. Rama Bai, who represents Patheriya Assembly seat in Madhya Pradesh's Damoh district, on Saturday evening supported the Citizenship (Amendment) Act at a function held in her constituency where Union minister Prahlad Patel was present.
Umesh Pal, the prime witness in the 2005 murder of Bahujan Samaj Party MLA Raju Pal, was shot dead outisde his residence in Prayagraj, the police said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi would have got a tough fight in Varanasi had Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contested against him as Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) candidate, feel party workers from the temple town.
Mayawati said both the BJP and the SP indulged in empty talks to win the votes of Dalits and Brahmins, but neither safeguarded their interests when in power.
'It's the same problem with all six of us. Behenji (Mayawati) is not to be blamed, but the coordinators have acted in a manner which has depressed us and we thought what is the use of remaining with such a party'
Polling for the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections will take place on Saturday, May 25, 2024, with 58 seats seats going to the polls across 8 states.
If the six MLAs voted against the party whip, they were liable for disqualification from the assembly.
The core BSP campaign continues to be 'cadre-based' and personal connect, such as knocking each door or through nukkad sabhas.
Hemant V Shivsaran/Rediff.com does a deep dive and lists the winners with the highest and lowest margins in the recent Lok Sabha elections.
The electoral exercise, the first since the Lok Sabha elections, will decide the fate of many veterans and some debutantes including Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu's wife Kamlesh Thakur.
Speaking to ANI, Mayawati said, "We have decided that to defeat the SP candidate in future MLC elections in UP, we will put all our force and even if we have to give our vote to BJP candidate or any party candidate, will do it. Any party candidate, who will be dominant over the SP's 2nd candidate, will get all the BSP MLAs' vote for sure."
The opposition parties on Sunday slammed the move to hire public servants through lateral entry, claiming it will snatch reservations from SCs, STs and OBCs, but the Bharatiya Janata Party hit back stating the National Democratic Alliance government was bringing transparency to this mode of recruitment started by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance.
'I will make Akash join the BSP movement and give him a chance to learn,' she said in a statement.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has called the meeting on Monday to discuss a strategy on protests over the CAA and the NRC.
The share of candidates who were successful among the BJP was 56.5% in 2019. It was 5% for the Congress.
An eighth BJP candidate on Thursday filed his nomination for the Rajya Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh, setting the stage for a contest with the Samajwadi Party on February 27.
BJP sources said the party has sought a reply from the South Delhi MP for his use of unparliamentary words.
The youth -- their dreams of government jobs unfulfilled -- are voicing their frustration.
Mayawati said she is fully assured that the people of the "Brahmin community will not get misled by the Bharatiya Janata Party and vote for the party in the upcoming elections".
He also said the governments of the Bharatiya Janata Party, the BSP and the SP that have ruled Uttar Pradesh in the last 32 years, when Congress was not in power, failed to live up to the expectations of the people and the Congress was set for a comeback in the state.
The BSP is planning to bring the second line of leadership from among the cadres.
BJP will find it tougher to push contentious Bills, especially those that would require Constitutional amendments, without the support of its allies and cooperation from the Opposition.
The best-case scenario is that the BJP will top out at around 50 seats in UP -- a drop of 12 from the 62 it had won in 2019. Taken in tandem with Maharashtra and Karnataka, this is what is likely to put paid to the BJP's ambitions of a third term for Modi, argues Prem Panicker.
Statistics show the BSP has always gained from pre-poll alliances, reflecting in the party winning more seats in subsequent elections and largely retaining the vote share too. Virendra Singh Rawat reports.
With their high-decibel campaigns so far, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Samajwadi Party may appear to be locked in a direct fight in Uttar Pradesh.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday declared 13 candidates from Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha polls including actor Arun Govil, who played Lord Ram in popular TV serial Ramayan, from Meerut, while replacing sitting MP Varun Gandhi from Pilibhit with state minister Jitin Prasada.
She lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Samajwadi Party and the Congress, holding them responsible for the lack of jobs and migration from the state.
Siddiqui, who hails from Banda, was earlier removed as the party in-charge of Uttar Pradesh and was appointed as the MP unit in-charge after the assembly poll debacle.
Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM, which is going to contest next year's Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls on the promise of creating leadership among Muslims, has created unease in the political parties that so far considered the members of the minority community as their core "vote bank".
'Unless she joins one of the coalitions, she has a bleak future.' 'The NDA option is suicidal, but INDIA could help her.'
The BSP will contest on 50 seats while the JJP on 40 in the 90 member state assembly polls due later this year.
A statement from the Congress said the party's disciplinary committee decided to suspend Kumbhani after a thorough discussion, adding it had come to the conclusion that the nomination form was rejected due to gross negligence on his part or "in connivance with the BJP".
Vijay has a lot of young and middle-aged women fans, but as voters, they are possibly now with the DMK, or remain with the AIADMK. Recapturing this constituency would have helped Vijay's political launch and the GOAT script and dialogues could have gone a long way in helping out. But the kind of script and screenplay and the unusually and equally unnecessary long run-time (3 hours, 3 minutes) that GOAT offers takes the film experience over the heads of those that are not familiar with secret agents and uranium theft in Tamil cinema, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Earlier this month, there were speculations that Nath might switch over to the BJP, but he refuted such reports as "creation of media."
Suspended Congress leader Nilesh Kumbhani, whose nomination form was rejected over discrepancies leading to Bharatiya Janata Party winning the Surat Lok Sabha seat in Gujarat unopposed, resurfaced on Saturday after 20 days and alleged it was the grand old party that had betrayed him first in 2017.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) gave a huge blow to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance by winning 43 seats out of total 80 Lok Sabha seats of Uttar Pradesh, as per the Election Commission.
'The Constitution of India defeated the BJP.'
Local Congress workers, led by city unit's working president Dinesh Savalia, staged a protest outside Kumbhani's locked house in Puna Gam area, calling him traitor and accusing him of giving a walkover to the BJP.
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