Patel's victory, which came against heavy odds, has given the Congress and the rest of the Opposition the confidence that Modi and Shah weren't invincible.
The Congress may have reviewed its poll debacle in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, but unease is growing in the party in crucial states such as Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, which had returned spectacular results in the last two Lok Sabha elections.
APCC president Ripun Bora said following discussions with various parties, it has been decided that the Congress will join hands with the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India-Marxist, Communist Party of India-Marxist Leninist and the Anchalik Gana Morcha.
Nitish also reiterated that he was "not a claimant" for the top post.
Is Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi listening to the right people before making crucial decisions? Renu Mittal reports.
"The 'UP-type' remark made by a Union minister is not appropriate at all. It only shows a narrow mindset," Sinha said.
People, cutting across all ages and from all walks of life, turned up to pay tribute to the child at the school where she was a student till Thursday.
The opposition alliance that will take on the ruling National Democratic Alliance in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections will be called Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) and an 11-member committee will be set up for coordination, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge announced after a meeting of the parties in Bengaluru.
If the Congress can simply go from 110 million to 130 million votes, it will yield a very different kind of NDA.
The government on Monday said it was willing to discuss every issue under rules during the Budget session of Parliament and sought the support of the Opposition in running the proceedings smoothly.
Elections will be held on June 10 to fill 57 Rajya Sabha seats from 15 states falling vacant due to the retirement of members on different dates between June and August, the Election Commission said on Thursday.
In a stunning blow to the BJP on Wednesday, the party lost bypolls to all the three Lok Sabha seats it contested, including its bastion Gorakhpur, and Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh, besides Araria in Bihar.
Kerala Chief Minister and CPI-M leader Pinarayi Vijayan, Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu, West Bengal CM and Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee, and Karnataka CM Kumaraswamy lent support to the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party government's fight with the Centre.
The latest development comes a day after the BJP decided to support Nitish Kumar's human chain for prohibition next week.
Opposition parties on Sunday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party after Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar and eight others were inducted into the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government, saying the ruling party's 'washing machine' has resumed its operation to clean tainted leaders and it was an 'ED-facilitated power grab'.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday called for a "main front" of all non-BJP parties to take on the ruling alliance in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls and asserted that the decision on its leadership can be taken later.
While the assembly elections are being seen as largely a contest between the NDA and the Grand Alliance, the state has been witness to mushrooming of "morchas" (fronts) which may queer the pitch for the lead players in a tight contest.
However, speculation remained rife that the meeting was part of Banerjee's plan to form an opposition front with regional players minus the Congress.
Senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar also said that an alliance similar to the one stitched up in Bihar is needed at the national level for the next Lok Sabha elections.
The resurgence that Congressmen feel is in fact more sentimental than substantive. The substantive reality is that the Congress is a party in terminal decline since 1989, says Shekhar Gupta.
The strengthening of regional outfits may weaken the grand old party's chances of leading a joint opposition front for the 2019 general elections.
'Modi and Shah know their politics. That is why the alarmed switch to reservations, and raising the threat from 'vote bank' politics,' says Shekhar Gupta.
Samajwadi Party and the Nationalist Congress Party on Monday announced entering into alliance for the coming Bihar assembly elections and claimed they were in talks with some other anti-BJP and anti-Congress regional parties.
Trinamool Congress MP Derek O'Brien said the situation in Bihar is one of the reasons behind the Parliament session being cut short by the government.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday came down heavily on opposition leaders, asserting that he will not "spare anyone involved in corruption" while pledging "to take every scamster to task".
What some of our leaders were up to on Monday and Tuesday.
Opposition leaders on Saturday lauded the Congress for its victory in Karnataka and thanked the people of the state, saying that this win has showed that 'Modi is not invincible'.
In an editorial in party mouthpiece Saamana, the party said that while on the one hand the Bharatiya Janata Party has already started preparing for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress is in dire straits.
P Chidambaram and Rajeev Shukla of the Congress, Bharatiya Janata Party's Sumitra Valmiki and Kavita Patidar, former Congress leader Kapil Sibal, Rashtriya Janata Dal's Misa Bharti and Jayant Chaudhary of the Rashtriya Lok Dal were among the 41 winners declared elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha.
Pawar, who had surprised the BJP by forging an unlikely alliance of Congress-Shiv Sena-NCP to form government in Maharashtra after the 2019 assembly elections, has already appealed to opposition parties to keep aside differences and join hands to challenge the Modi juggernaut.
The Congress president's election comes up early next year and party workers fear Sonia may pass on her mantle to Rahul. If that happens or if she continues to remain at the helm but Rahul calls the shots, there could be large scale desertions of workers and leaders worried about their future.
'He is a key fulcrum point in the pan-Indian creation of an effective Opposition to the BJP.'
The Congress is "not a factor" in the Assembly polls in Bihar as the situation in the state is vastly different from that in Uttar Pradesh, which had seen the revival of the ruling party at the Centre, JD(U) chief Sharad Yadav said.
He told PTI in an interview that parties that are still thinking of 'being the leader' of a possible united front against the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls have not understood the gravity of the situation at all.
The Congress on Thursday virtually ruled out any grand alliance in poll bound Uttar Pradesh including with Samajwadi Party insisting that Rahul Gandhi wanted to set things right in the state which is in bad shape for past 27 years in non-Congress rule.
The BJP sought to distance itself from its leader's sexist comments.
A Bihar court on Saturday summoned Congress President Sonia Gandhi to appear before it on July 29 in connection with a complaint alleging that her depiction in posters in Uttar Pradesh in 2007 as Goddess Durga was an "insult to Hindu religion."
If only the Congress could rebuild on its strengths and develop a modern enough ideology, we could again be moving towards a clearer two-party political landscape, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
The Nitish Kumar government is leaving no stones unturned to plug the loopholes in the implementation liquor ban.
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