It was in Kolar in 2019, during Lok Sabha election campaigning, that he made a remark on the Modi surname for which he was convicted of criminal defamation and stripped of his Parliament membership last month.
The Congress party alleged that the BJP government has asked social media platform 'X' to remove Home Minister Amit Shah's speech from the Rajya Sabha, which they claim insulted Babasaheb Ambedkar. The party cited an email from 'X' to support their claim. The BJP has not yet commented on the matter, and 'X' has refused to delete the speech, citing freedom of speech. The Congress accused Shah of insulting the architect of the Indian Constitution and demanded his resignation.
Gandhi, who is on a whirlwind two-day tour of Kerala as part of Lok Sabha poll campaign and is contesting from Wayanad besides his family bastion Amethi, took time off his hectic schedule to pay obeisance at the famed Thirunelli temple near the stream.
Besides the national capital, polling for the sixth round of the marathon seven-phase elections will be held Saturday in 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, all 10 seats of Haryana, eight seats each in Bihar and West Bengal, six seats in Odisha, four seats in Jharkhand and one seat in Jammu and Kashmir.
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.
The Delhi assembly results have underscored that a section of Arvind Kejriwal's committed supporters abandoned him because they were let down by his refusal to take a stand on crucial issues that impinge on the security and Constitutionally enshrined rights of the people, notes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra claimed that the home ministry's decision to cancel the FCRA licences of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and the Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust for alleged violation of laws has "exposed" their corruption.
Aiming to retain power at the Centre for the third time in a row, the Bharatiya Janata Party while banking heavily on its sitting MPs on Saturday released the first list of 51 candidates from Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha elections.
'Don't be surprised if the Census forms come with a caste box.' 'I will be surprised if it doesn't. It will be a point conceded to Rahul Gandhi and his allies,' asserts Shekhar Gupta. The BJP machine could take all 3 in its stride, but this election has changed that, notes Shekhar Gupta.
What some of our leaders were up to this week.
According to sources, Gandhi himself is taking stock of poll preparedness by talking to leaders and listening to their views for poll strategy.
After arriving in Guwahati on a special flight from Goa, Gandhi straightaway reached Srimanta Sankardeva Kalakshetra, where the three-time chief minister's body has been kept for the public to pay their last respect.
There are concerns within the Congress with respect to the articulation of the party's demand for the caste census, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently accusing the grand old party of attempting to divide Hindus through its push for the Other Backward Classes.
Sources said besides giving approval to the polls schedule, the members of the CWC, the party's highest decision-making body, could also express confidence in the leadership provided by Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.
Congress leaders alleged the BJP has made and failed in its every attempt to defame Rahul Gandhi and derail the yatra somehow as people from across the country including Delhi are overwhelmingly extending their support.
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra would accompany him to Wayanad.
The Congress chief will also be contesting from Amethi in Uttar Pradesh.
Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said the party stood united and together as a family and there are no dissensions pending after the announcement of elections to the party chief's post.
'Are we so ready to believe that in this country whose virtues we constantly shout from the rooftops, there is no single person -- other than Modi -- in a minimum of 272 elected MPs with the talent and ability to lead this country?' asks Prem Panicker.
The meeting comes in the backdrop of the shock resignation of party veteran Ghulam Nabi Azad on Friday and his letter to party president Sonia Gandhi in which he lashed out at Rahul Gandhi for 'demolishing the party's entire consultative mechanism'.
'Rahul Gandhi has personally paid a heavy price for this character assassination and remorseless ridiculing and the Congress, of course, has been demolished politically.'
Babaria said he offered his resignation to the high command soon after the result of the Haryana assembly polls came out last week but no decision has been communicated to him over the matter.
Rahul Gandhi, in turn, thanked all the leaders for reposing faith in him and said he would apply his mind on their request of becoming the Congress president, the sources said.
The Congress top brass headed by party chief Mallikarjun Kharge held a review meeting on Thursday on the party's shock defeat in the Haryana assembly polls and discussed the possible reasons for the 'unexpected' results.
The final round of voting for the Jharkhand Assembly elections is taking place on Wednesday, with the JMM-Congress-RJD coalition seeking to retain power while the BJP-led NDA aims to take control. The election will decide the fate of Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, his wife, and several other candidates. Key issues during the campaign included alleged infiltration from Bangladesh, corruption, and Hindutva.
The highlight of the five-hour meeting, which ended with a plan to hold a 'chintan shivir' at the earliest opportunity to chalk the Congress' future strategy, was a demand by Sonia Gandhi's loyalists that Rahul Gandhi should assume the party leadership again.
To chart the Congress's future course, its chief Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday formed three groups -- on political affairs for guidance on key issues, task force-2024 to implement the Udaipur 'Nav Sankalp' declaration, and another to coordinate the October 2 'harat Jodo Yatra.
Setting aside their bitterness, both within and outside Parliament, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi shook hands at a function to felicitate NCP supremo Sharad Pawar, who turned 75 on Thursday.
Leaders of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) have decided to raise the NEET issue in both houses of Parliament on Friday and members will give notices in this regard, sources have said.
The stakes are significant for the BJP in this round as the party had in 2019 won an overwhelming majority of these seats, including all in Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, that will go to polls on May 7.
While Sonia Gandhi has been avoiding attending public events, Rahul Gandhi left on a short personal visit abroad only on Sunday.
Varun Gandhi contesting from the Bharatiya Janata Party and describing the seat as his late father Sanjay Gandhi's karambhoomi is seen as a comedy of errors by his opponent, Congress' Amita Singh, who asserts that while bringing in these emotions, he forgets that his father was a Congressman.
Away from the distraction of its new high-profile politics, Wayanad's worries seemed very down to earth, discovers Shyam G Menon.
'The consecration of Ram Lalla in Ayodhya has demoralised them.' 'And, now it is reflecting in their individual reactions as they are losing hope to take on the BJP in 2024.'
Raking up the border issue, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday said every individual in Ladakh knows that China has "taken away our land" and claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's assertion that not an inch of land was taken away was "absolutely false".
Congress supporters in Assam are upbeat about their party vice president Rahul Gandhi's upcoming road show in the villages along with a massive rally in the state during his visit on February 25 and 26.
Party leaders, sources said, maintained that Congress cannot afford to have a new leader at the helm for rebuilding the organisation at this juncture and that the responsibility for the defeat is collective and not individual.
Right to apprenticeship, legal guarantee for MSP, passing a constitutional amendment to raise the 50 per cent cap on reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs, a nation-wide caste census and scrapping of Agnipath scheme are among the promises made by the Congress in its Lok Sabha polls manifesto released on Friday.
According to an agreement reached after the telephonic conversation between Priyanka Gandhi and Yadav, the Congress has now got seats such as Sitapur and Barabanki.
Mistry said the election authority is in the process of finalising the AICC delegates who will vote in the crucial election for the top party post.
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