Sources said senior leaders of the party have been told to reach out to other leaders of the alliance and talks with some parties have begun.
The Bharatiya Janata Party was on Thursday poised for a landslide victory in Gujarat to retain power for a record seventh straight term but was behind the Congress in Himachal Pradesh which could go with the trend of alternative governments in the hill state.
Voting for by-elections to seven assembly constituencies of six states, including Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Kerala, Tripura, West Bengal, and Jharkhand, started on Tuesday at 7 am.
The Congress under a 'no surrender' policy evolved by Rahul Gandhi has decided to play tough in all the states where the party is negotiating with prospective and even existing alliance partners. The aim is to bag the largest number of seats possible.
In nearly 100 seats, the BJP stands almost no chance of winning. In 200 seats, it is a direct fight between the BJP and the Congress where the BJP has an upper hand. In 243 seats, the BJP is pitted against regional parties and it is not going to be easy. That is why 400 seats may end up as a pipe dream, states Ramesh Menon, author of Modi Demystified: The Making of a Prime Minister.
Tandon, son former Chhattisgarh governor late Balramji Das Tandon, assured everyone that he will live up to the expectations and the trust which the BJP has reposed in him.
The share of candidates who were successful among the BJP was 56.5% in 2019. It was 5% for the Congress.
According to a senior Congress leader, the constituents of the opposition alliance intend to move forward with the theme "Main Nahin, Hum (We, Not Me)" at the meeting.
The Election Commission on Monday censured BJP leader Dilip Ghosh and Congress'd Supriya Shrinate for derogatory remarks against the dignity of women.
Senior Trinamool Congress leader Subrata Mukherjee died while being treated for cardiac ailments at a state-run hospital in Kolkata on Thursday, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday named 14 candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls including former Union minister R P N Singh and Sudhanshu Trivedi -- the only outgoing MP renominated by the party.
According to the TMC, the momentum built by the INDIA bloc over three successful meetings has dwindled in the last few months due to inactivity, with the Congress preoccupied with elections in three states.
This election will be remembered for being the first election where the Election Commission failed to take action on gross violations involving the ruling party that repeatedly used religion, communal slurs, lies and undocumented allegations, observes Ramesh Menon.
Is it is necessary to play divisive politics to succeed in the next general elections? asks Dr Sudhir Bisht.
The opposition Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) was in the grip of a crisis on Saturday with the Janata Dal-United saying the alliance was collapsing amid indications that Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar will switch back to the National Democratic Alliance, prompting the Congress to allege that the Bharatiya Janata Party is doing its best to cause a 'mini implosion' in the coalition.
In the last five years, 480 candidates with declared cases related to hate speech have contested elections to state assemblies, the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, the ADR said.
According to insiders, their lack of enthusiasm is showing on the ground. There is nothing to suggest that their enthusiasm will return in the final four phases of polling, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday received wholehearted support from a group of women from the troubled Sandeshkhali area who met her after a Trinamool Congress rally in Kolkata, party sources said.
The Congress will begin the Rahul Gandhi-led Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra from the violence-hit Manipur on Sunday, in what is being seen as the party's bid to set the narrative in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls and put the spotlight on issues such as unemployment, price rise and social justice.
West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar was on Saturday announced as the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance's vice presidential candidate.
'Union Budgets are often used as political instruments and that was the intention of this government too.' 'But while the exercise has settled two fronts, it has left open several others and this has the potential to aggravate with time,' predicts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Reacting sharply to Banerjee's fulminations, the Congress struck back pointing out that Prime Minster Narendra Modi's and her stand were similar, with one seeking a 'Congress 'Mukt' (Free) India' and the other, an 'Opposition coalition sans Congress'.
Emerging from a meeting with Banerjee at the state secretariat, Yadav said that the first priority of his party was to stop the Bharatiya Janata Party's progress in West Bengal.
The Congress on Thursday renamed the Rahul Gandhi-led Manipur-Mumbai yatra starting on January 14 as the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, which will travel through 100 Lok Sabha segments in 15 states including Arunachal Pradesh, and asserted it will prove to be as 'transformative' as his earlier cross-country march.
On Tuesday, when trends indicated she was going to win her election, the four-time National Award winner said, 'Heartfelt gratitude to all the people of Mandi for this love and trust... This victory belongs to all of you, this is the victory of your trust in Prime Minister Modi and the BJP, this is the victory of Sanatan and in the honour of Mandi.'
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.
What some of our leaders were up to on Thursday, October 5, 2023.
As BJP leaders went all out to project the event as a moment of national pride, some leaders were directly critical of the ceremony with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, belonging to the Communist Party of India-Marxist, slamming the state's role in the Ram Temple consecration, saying the line that demarcates religion and state seems to be 'getting thinner and thinner'.
With the reality of coalition politics staring the BJP in its face, this was inevitable, points out Ramesh Menon.
Citing Section 144 CrPC was in force in parts of Sandeshkhali and it would not be prudent to allow them access to the area even in groups of four-five, senior police officers stopped their convoy at the Bhojerhat area, which is around 52 km from the riverine area, on Basanti Highway.
FHe is the only one among 17 ministers from the outgoing council of ministers who lost the Lok Sabha polls to be reappointed minister.
Shah said the new laws would give priority to providing justice, unlike the colonial-era laws that gave primacy to penal action, and made reporting of crimes even easier by recognising e-FIR, Zero FIR and electronic or digital evidence.
West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee President Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Saturday criticised the statements of West Bengal ministers against Ratan Tata, and said Tata's views and opinions about the development of the state would always be welcomed by the people of Bengal.
The words 'industry', 'industrial development', 'jobs', and 'employment' have been ringing with higher frequency since Mamata Banerjee stepped into her third term with landslide victory after a high-octane election last year. "Our government's next target is industrial development," the chief minister (CM) had been heard stating at different public meetings in the past few months - perhaps setting the tone for the sixth edition of the Bengal Global Business Summit (BGBS) slated for later this month. Investor summits by any state are about intent, big numbers, and tall claims. Yet in competitive federalism, its importance as a marketing tool is undeniable.
The resolution was passed during the state Cabinet meeting chaired by Chief Minister Kamal Nath, public relations department minister P C Sharma told reporters. Kerala, Punjab, Rajasthan and West Bengal have already passed resolutions demanding scrapping of the CAA.
The list of guests included celebrities from across the globe, politicians, the who's who of Hindi and south Indian cinema world and almost all the top cricketers of the country.
Delayed by more than four years, rules for the CAA are a must for its implementation.
This time Modi has no emotive message to take to the stump. Muscular nationalism doesn't work against the backdrop of China's successive inroads into Indian territory. Rising prices is a sore point that cuts across class and caste barriers; unprecedented levels of unemployment has the youth in a ferment. This has reduced the BJP campaign to a laundry list of recycled grievances and thinly veiled communal appeals, neither of which are working as well as they have in the past, argues Prem Panicker.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances