Incidentally, 164 of the total 356 candidates in the fray from the 43 assembly seats of Jammu region got less votes than none of the above, which gives an option to voters to reject all candidates in a constituency.
The BJP, which rules the Centre, is in power in Uttarakhand, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Goa, Assam, Tripura, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, and is all set to get Madhya Pradesh back and snatch Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh from the Congress after today's vote count.
The party has fielded Parvati Das for the by-election to the Bageshwar assembly seat in Uttarakhand and Lijinlal G for the Puthuppally assembly seat in Kerala.
Opposition leaders have slammed the Bharatiya Janata Party over its Lok Sabha member Ramesh Bidhuri, who is in the eye of a storm for his derogatory comments against Bahujan Samaj Party MP Danish Ali, being given poll responsibility by the party in Rajasthan's Tonk district.
As many as 624 candidates are in the fray in this round of voting being held in Pilibhit, Lakhimpur Kheri, Sitapur, Hardoi, Unnao, Lucknow, Rae Bareli, Banda, and Fatehpur districts.
BSP VP Jai Prakash Singh Rahul Gandhi will not succeed in Indian politics because his mother was a foreigner.
The SP chief said they will now "consult" the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Gondwana Gantantra Party for the Madhya Pradesh polls.
As leaders in both the BJP and Congress concede, neither has within their parties a leader to match Arvind Kejriwal's charisma in Delhi.
UP Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said the BJP parliamentary board and its national leadership will decide under whom the upcoming state assembly elections will be fought.
Sirsa MP Kumari Selja will campaign for the Congress and address a public meeting in Narwana this week, party general secretary Randeep Surjewala said on Monday after the Bharatiya Janata Party targeted the grand old party over alleged infighting amid reports that she was sulking.
When asked from where Akhilesh Yadav will contest, the source said that the party has not yet disclosed the seat.
Behind its high-decibel campaign, powered by well-organised party machinery, the BJP also appears to have made a slight departure from its 'next generation' approach to stay ahead of an aggressive Congress and enhance its prospects of securing a majority of seats.
In the chair was Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, a Bharatiya Janata Party leader of the old school with friends across parties unlike the duo who currently run the BJP.
'They could have told the media that there is nothing in it and let me read it out.'
Over 50 people have been arrested after the communal violence in Maharajgaj town, officials said on Tuesday, as markets remained shut and people stayed indoors for a second day in a row amid heavy deployment of police and other security personnel.
The youth -- their dreams of government jobs unfulfilled -- are voicing their frustration.
The ruling BJP-led coalition ended Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan's over four-decade dominance in Rampur with its ally Apna Dal-Sonelal winning the Suar assembly by-election by a margin of 8,724 votes.
The Election Commission has asked the Uttar Pradesh government to cover all the statues of Chief Minister Mayawati and elephants, the Bahujan Samaj Party's poll symbol, installed in public places across Uttar Pradesh. Do you think the statues can influence voters?
An Uttar Pradesh government spokesperson said a formal order for all eateries along the Kanwar Yatra route in the state was likely to be issued soon.
In a series of tweets, she attacked the SP accusing it of being an expert in "narrow politics".
Sticking with the Brahmin-OBC combination for deputy chief ministers, Brajesh Pathak and Keshav Prasad Maurya took oath on Friday as deputies of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
Despite heavy snowfall in Srinagar, the rally to mark the culmination of Bharat Jodo Yatra went ahead, with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other prominent leaders of opposition parties addressing the march.
A total of 517 candidates have withdrawn their candidature till on Monday, even as parties faced "rebel trouble" in several segments.
Akhilesh's fielding candidates from a broad spectrum of castes, not just Yadavs, and with the BJP losing in several seats in Purvanchal, suggests that smaller OBC communities shifted from the BJP to the SP in the region.
Surprisingly, the BJP's nearest rival in ad spend was not the Congress, but the Bharat Rashtra Samithi.
Ahmed Patel, who was undergoing treatment at a Gurugram hospital after testing positive for COVID-19, breathed his last after multi-organ failure in the wee hours of Wednesday, his son Faisal confirmed.
It would be better if the Supreme Court takes cognisance of this 'extremely serious and worrisome' incident, which is being discussed across the country, the former Uttar Pradesh chief minister said.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati, who had drawn flak from the Supreme Court for wasting taxpayers' money by building parks and installing her statues, on Saturday warned the ruling Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh that any move to make changes in the memorials erected during her regime could create law and order problem.
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.
Last month, the Channi government replaced the state's advocate general A P S Deol after strong opposition from Sidhu.
The RLD has aligned with the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party in UP and is attacking the state government on farm distress and the outstanding sugarcane dues.
Meanwhile, the Congress and RSP whole-heartedly backed the Kollam MP.
"The court of Additional Sessions Judge/First MP-MLA Court Durgesh also imposed a fine of Rs 5 lakh on Mukhtar and Rs 1 lakh on Afzal," ADGC Criminal Neeraj Srivastava said.
Bharatiya Janata Party MPs Sunny Deol and Sanjay Dhotre were among those who missed casting their votes in the presidential poll on Monday.
Gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad's son Asad, wanted in the Umesh Pal murder case, was killed in an encounter with the Uttar Pradesh police in Jhansi on Thursday, officials said.
Forty-two of the 102 Lok Sabha seats going to polls in the general election's first phase are constituencies that have three or more candidates facing criminal cases, according to a poll rights body.
Besides disclosing in their affidavits, candidates have to prominently declare criminal cases they are facing, if any, thrice in newspapers in print as well on television, he said, adding that political parties too have to publish within three days of nomination why a candidate with criminal background was selected. "You (political parties) have to tell the public whether you did not get any (other) candidate and why was it necessary to select them (those with criminal background)," he said.
Mayawati said marvelous memorials and parks built to honour "ignored" gurus and sants born in Dalit and OBC communities are a new grand identity and tourist attractions in the state.
According to district officer Hardoi Mangla Prasad Singh, Khan Mubarak (43) had pneumonia and was undergoing treatment for the past several days.
The SP has offered 11 seats to the Congress and seven seats to the RLD for the upcoming parliamentary elections.
