"Word of the day! Definition of *snollygoster* US dialect: a shrewd, unprincipled politician. First Known Use: 1845. Most recent use: 26/7/17," Tharoor had tweeted in 2017.
A total of 71 assembly constituencies of Bihar spread across 16 districts went to polls on Wednesday in the first phase amid tight security and with COVID-19 guidelines in place.
Although the Bihar CM is mum over his next move, speculations of a rift between Mahagathbandhan and JD-U leader Nitish Kumar joining the NDA, have been soaring high.
The Election Commission of India has set up more than 200 polling stations within housing societies in the urban areas of Uttar Pradesh to increase the voter turnout in the politically crucial state.
The three-day-old Jitan Ram Manjhi government in Bihar won the trust vote in the state assembly amid walkout by opposition the Bharatiya Janata Party.
In a tweet, he also asked them to wear masks and maintain social distancing.
Among the keenly watched contests are those involving former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav (Kannauj, UP) and Union ministers Giriraj Singh (Begusarai, Bihar), Nityanand Rai (Ujiarpur, Bihar) and Raosaheb Danve (Jalna, Maharashtra).
The BJP held a meet amid hints that the central leadership may bring in new faces at key positions in the state.
Ironically, rival Tamil Nadu governments expend the most on social welfare schemes, especially targeting women and youth and children, but that money comes only by selling more liquor. There is always the specious plea, which has been peddled very many times in the past, that without licensed liquor, drinkers would go after hooch and there could be more hooch tragedies and hooch deaths. No one is convinced, but no one can dispute it either, comments N Sathiya Moorthy.
An LJP parliamentary board meeting chaired by its president Chirag Paswan instead passed a resolution in favour of an alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party and said its MLAs will work to strengthen the hand of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
According to sources, Gandhi himself is taking stock of poll preparedness by talking to leaders and listening to their views for poll strategy.
The passage of the women's reservation bill has ignited hope among stakeholders about attaining gender equality in India's political landscape, especially at the policy-making level, even as some raised concerns over its effectiveness given the uncertainty in the deadline for its implementation.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
While the BJP and the Congress have always supported the bill, opposition by other parties and demands from some for quota for backward classes within the women's quota have been key sticking points.
Sinha would oversee the presidential poll process as an international observer.
Sources in both the BJP and the Janata Dal-United suggested such a possibility but it remained unclear if Kumar, the unquestioned leader of his party, has finalised a deal with the BJP top brass.
The EC said polling percentage in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat in Jammu and Kashmir is the highest in 40 years.
The counting of votes for the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh polls along with six assembly and one Lok Sabha by-elections will commence at 8 am on Thursday with prohibitory orders in place around counting halls to ensure peace and tranquillity.
An approximate voter turnout of 59.06 per cent was recorded in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections on Saturday in 58 constituencies across six states and two Union territories with the polling percentage in the Jangal Mahal region of West Bengal touching 78.19.
Bihar has fertile grounds for caste to emerge as an electoral issue.
Meanwhile, hectic activity was seen at 10, Circular Road, the bungalow allotted to party president Lalu Prasad's wife Rabri Devi who shares the house with her husband and younger son Tejashwi Yadav, the deputy CM.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United on Tuesday took out processions across the state, urging people to be on guard against the Bharatiya Janata Party's alleged politics of communalism.
The Bihar government led by Nitish Kumar has withdrew security cover given to Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo and Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav.
A day after Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi hinted at the next Bihar assembly polls being held in September-October, most of the political parties including ruling Janata Dal-United and Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party claimed they were fully ready for it.
At least 12 people, a third of them children, were killed and several others were injured when a speeding truck ploughed into a religious procession in Bihar's Vaishali district on Sunday evening, officials said.
He served as the Union health minister in Modi's first term from November 9, 2014 to May 30, 2019.
JD-U chief whip Shravan Kumar said those defying the whip "will lose their membership" even as he maintained that it was a "routine exercise that takes place ahead of every assembly session".
Subhashini Yadav, a social worker, said she is taking the responsibility of carrying on the fight of the 'Mahagathbandhan' in Bihar, as her father Sharad Yadav has always supported it.
For now, Modi's government appears singularly focussed on demonstrating that it is not in any way inhibited by the BJP's loss of a majority, and will continue along its patented path of bulldozing all opposition and doing just as it likes, asserts Prem Panicker.
Chouhan's fate will be determined by the BJP central command's assessment of the implications of such a move ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
'The issue has been cleared by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief J P Nadda much before the elections'
The order issued by Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla is a slight modification of the reopening guidelines issued on September 30 where the political gatherings were allowed from October 15. The political gatherings can be held only outside the containment zones.
'Nitish Kumar's newly-formed alliance with BJP would unravel before the 2025 assembly polls in Bihar'
'Bihar's caste survey has bolstered the Opposition parties, but one shouldn't forget that the BJP is also trying to present itself as a party that cares for the OBCs more than other parties,' points out Sanjay Kumar.
In the battle for 2024, the place is hogging the limelight, primarily because of Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, who according to some opinion polls, may turn out to be the dark horse when votes are counted on June 4.
State RJD president Jagadanand Singh on Saturday announced its candidates for two seats, having done the same for 21 others a week ago, and declared that it was leaving one for the Left parties.
How Modi retrieves the situation and how he enlists new allies in the next two years will show if the BJP is fighting fit, report Sunil Gatade and Venkatesh Kesari.
The Nitish Kumar cabinet on Saturday decided to call winter session of the legislative assembly from November 30.
At the meeting which lasted for more than half an hour, the leaders of the two parties are understood to have discussed the key issue of seat-sharing among alliance partners in the NDA, which also includes Ram Vilas Paswan's LJP.
The Bihar CM further recounted the work done by his government to boost social welfare in the state and the efforts to strengthen the law and order in the state.
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