Atiq Ahmed is named in more than 100 criminal cases, including the recent Umesh Pal murder case
Sources said the opposition parties would look to avoid the prickly leadership question as of now and emphasise on building a common ground.
'Outside the core voter base of upper caste Hindus, there is a large section unhappy with the performance of the BJP.'
Voting began on Thursday in the by-election to seven assembly constituencies in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
The old alliance between the BJP and the SAD broke last year when the Shiromani Akali Dal quit the National Democratic Alliance over the farm laws.
While the ruling BJP, riding on the Modi juggernaut, wants to break the 38-year jinx and retain its southern citadel, the Congress is seeking to wrest power to give the party much-needed elbow room and momentum to position itself as the main opposition player in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The bullet-riddled bodies of Ahmad and Ashraf were taken away from the spot as tension gripped the area after the sensational killing.
The BJP and its allies won all assembly seats in Modi's Varanasi and Adityanath's Gorakhpur, and the SP bagged all 10 segments in Yadav's Azamgarh Lok Sabha constituency.
Bharatiya Janata Party MPs Sunny Deol and Sanjay Dhotre were among those who missed casting their votes in the presidential poll on Monday.
SP chief spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said Akhilesh will not participate in the yatra, nor will any other leader from the party.
Bahujan Samaj Party MP from Uttar Pradesh Dhananjay Singh and his wife Jagriti were on Tuesday arrested in connection with the murder of their 35-year-old maid and "mercilessly" torturing another minor domestic help with sticks and rods.
Bahujan Samaj Party Member of Parliament Dhananjay Singh, arrested along with his wife Jagriti Singh in connection with murder of their maid, was on Friday denied by a Delhi court which observed that he had "actively participated" in atrocities which aggravated the miseries of his domestic helps.
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.
They said members of Congress and Bahujan Samaj Party urged committee chairman Jual Oram to allow a discussion on the Agnipath scheme, arguing it has huge implications and required parliamentary scrutiny, but were denied from doing so.
What provoked Ashok Gehlot's belligerence was Sachin Pilot's participation in the Bharat Jodo Yatra with Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi in Madhya Pradesh. Gehlot was also aware that Rajasthan assembly Speaker C P Joshi had met Rahul in Maharashtra.
The Uttar Pradesh government has accorded 'Y' category security to Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) president Om Prakash Rajbhar, an alliance partner of the Samajwadi Party, officials said on Friday.
As many as 623 candidates, including 73 women are in the fray in the first phase and around 2.28 core voters, including 1.24 crore men and 1.04 crore women are eligible to caste their francise, election officials said.
'Congress and BSP are in the fray, but not in the contest.'
Alva said she believes that by supporting the BJP in this election, such parties and leaders have damaged their own credibility.
Various opposition parties like the Congress, the Trinamool Congress, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the Nationalist Congress Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Communist Party of India, and the Communist Party of India-Marxist raised vociferous protests in the upper house while opposing the resolution and the bill.
Earlier in the day, BSP supremo Mayawati said her party will make efforts to not field 'bahubali' (strongmen) or mafia candidates in the upcoming polls and announced that Ansari, who is lodged in a jail in Banda, will not be given a ticket from Mau again.
Ansari had in a hearing told the court that a contract of Rs 5 crore had been given for his killing inside the jail and that unauthorised people entered the prison without making any entry in the register, according to his lawyer.
Bahujan Samaj Party MP Dhananjay Singh and his wife Jagriti, arrested in connection with the murder of their maid, were on Saturday remanded to two-day police custody by a Delhi court after police told a court in New Delhi that they have to confront them with recordings of CCTV footage regarding the identity of some unidentified persons seen in it.
The Kollegal MLA said he will not attend the floor test on the direction of party supremo Mayawati.
With the Yogi Adityanath government taking credit for cracking down on criminals and making it an election issue, political parties are now having a rethink on aligning with those who have a criminal background but also enjoy influence in their areas.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati on Friday said the Election Commission should take suo moto cognisance of the manner in which Bharatiya Janata Party prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi filed his nomination from Varanasi at the time when the sixth phase of polling was being held all over the country, including Uttar Pradesh.
A 55-year-old Dalit government official and his wife were found murdered in their house in an Azamgarh village on Monday morning with their throats slit open with some sharp-edged weapon, police said.
The BJP has many ruthless leaders with super-sharp political minds. But none has all this and Yogi's charisma and personal ambition, observes Shekhar Gupta.
November 14 was the last day for filing nominations for the high-stakes Municipal Corporation of Delhi elections for 250 wards.
Yadav struck deals with the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress whenever needed to form or save the governments led by him in Uttar Pradesh.
The court granted relief to Ashish Pandey on furnishing a personal bond of Rs 50,000 and one surety of the like amount.
The mayor and deputy mayor of Delhi will be elected on Tuesday by the second municipal House after the December 4 civic polls.
The Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Lok Dal and some smaller parties will contest the 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly polls together, and an announcement in this regard would be made soon, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav said on Tuesday.
Khushi Dubey, Hari Shankar Tiwari and Mata Prasad Pandey represent the resentment among Brahmins towards the Adityanath government. Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
Rajendra Gudha, Sandeep Yadav, Wajib Ali, Lakhan Meena, (Bahujan Samaj Party turned Congress MLAs), Girraj Singh Malinga and Khiladi Lal Bairwa met Gehlot, the sources said.
Mulayam's last rites will be performed with full state honours in Saifai near Etawah in Uttar Pradesh
In the 2017 assembly election, the voter turnout in the first phase covering the same 89 constituencies stood at 66.75 per cent.
The panchayat polls or those for district panchayat chiefs are not held on a party symbol but candidates enjoy the tacit support of various parties.
The Congress' central election authority on Thursday issued a notification for the All India Congress Committee president polls, setting the ball rolling for electing the successor to the longest-serving party chief Sonia Gandhi.
The man who fired the first shot at Umesh Pal, a key witness in the killing of former Bahujan Samaj Party legislator Raju Pal, was gunned down in an encounter with Prayagraj police early Monday, officials said.
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