This will be the 49-year-old JMM leader's fourth stint as chief minister. Soren retained the Barhait seat, defeating BJP's Gamliyel Hembrom by a margin of 39,791 votes in the recent assembly polls.
Kumar said that while the rise in percentage of population of the deprived castes has led to increase in the quotas for SCs, STs and OBCs from 50 to 65 per cent, his government also planned to undertake a number of welfare measures for the benefit of "94 lakh families", which according to the survey lived in abject poverty.
The constitution of a committee by the Centre to explore the feasibility of "one nation, one election" has opened up the possibility of Lok Sabha polls being advanced so that they could be held with a string of state assembly polls.
Tejashwi, who has been chosen by the anti-National Democratic Alliance grouping as its chief ministerial candidate, is seeking re-election from Raghopur seat he won on his maiden outing in electoral politics in 2015.
The term of the 243-member Bihar legislative assembly comes to an end on November 29.
The Congress party suffered a crushing defeat in the Delhi elections, failing to secure a single seat in the 70-member assembly for the third consecutive time. Key candidates, including Sheila Dikshit's son, Sandeep Dikshit, lost their deposits. The only consolation for the party was a slight improvement in its vote share, which they attribute to a vigorous campaign and a renewed focus on contesting elections independently. However, the defeat raises questions about the party's ability to compete in the upcoming 2024 Lok Sabha elections, particularly in light of its performance in other recent state elections.
Concealed beneath the feat, which testifies to his political acumen and survival instincts, is the fact that the 72-year-old leader could never remain at peace with his allies which also made him change partners frequently.
The long-standing Bharatiya Janata Party-Janata Dal-United alliance stood the test of time again with the combine scoring a landslide victory in the Bihar assembly polls on the development plank.
The Chief Election Commissioner pointed out that the exercise involved nearly 7.3 crore voters and over 1.06 lakh polling stations.
'This is injustice to Shinde. Are they trying to say that he is not good enough to be the CM?'
Ananth Kumar, the BJP election in-charge of Bihar, on Tuesday announced that the party will not declare the name of its chief ministerial candidate.
Irrespective of the number of seats the Grand Alliance led by the RJD gets, it is a "good achievement" and it will give inspiration to the young generation, Pawar added.
Nearly 3,000 polling booths have been identified as sensitive, and special security arrangements, including drone surveillance, have been ensured at some of these locations.
The plea, seeking quashing of the government notification to dissolve the Bihar Assembly, was filed by Shivkumar Prasad Singh.
Loss of power in Bihar has upset the Bharatiya Janata Party's calculations for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls but a section of its leaders also see a chance for the party to break the dominance of regional parties in the state, like it has in Uttar Pradesh.
Raut said the issue of passage of farm sector bills in the Parliament will have no impact on the elections in Bihar as the state votes "only on the basis of caste and religion".
There is a proposal from the BJP camp that they would resort to a proportion-based increase in the number of Lok Sabha seats for individual states, based on what they now have. On the face of it, this sounds like a fine argument that those demanding a 'freeze' now cannot oppose without reasons and justification, avers N Sathiya Moorthy.
Lalu's son and heir apparent Tejashwi Yadav, however, sought to downplay the remarks made by his father, in an interview to a local news channel, claiming that the RJD supremo had merely tried to satisfy the curiosity of the prying media.
'The issue has been cleared by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party chief J P Nadda much before the elections'
'Leave alone top gear, we are in the neutral and when we are applying gears, we are applying reverse'
The Janata Dal (United) has demanded action against BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla for his comments targeting an AAP leader, which the regional party said has caused deep displeasure among people from Purvanchal. The JD(U) said Poonawalla's remarks, made during a TV debate, were offensive and demanded action from the BJP leadership. The incident comes ahead of the Delhi Assembly elections, where the AAP is facing a tough challenge from the BJP.
On Wednesday, the Bihar Cabinet in a meeting chaired by the chief minister passed a resolution on asking the Centre to include the provision in the 9th Schedule of the Constitution, Siddharth said.
The CEC said 7.2 crore single-use gloves for voters to press electronic voting machine buttons, more than seven lakh units of hand sanitiser, about 46 lakh masks, about six lakh personal protection equipment (PPE) kits, 7.6 lakh units of face shields have been arranged.
Voters of Bihar have made it clear that their aspiration and priority are development alone, Modi said in a series of tweets, adding that the people's blessings for the NDA's good governance show what are the state's dreams and expectations.
The governor accepted Kumar's resignation, and asked him to continue as caretaker CM till a new government is formed, they said.
Uncertainty shadows the composition of the two main political alliances in Bihar with several parties still exploring their choices as the Election Commission on Friday announced the schedule for the assembly polls.
Bihar has fertile grounds for caste to emerge as an electoral issue.
Paswan said he was willing to contest the upcoming Bihar assembly polls as an NDA partner "if the BJP so desires", and made light of estranged uncle Pashupati Kumar Paras' recent meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
With its age-old fascination for education, southern states have done better than the North. Start-ups, IT hubs, and industry majors setting up shop have changed the face of the South. Nearly 79% of global offices set up by international conglomerates in India are in the South. Almost 46% of tech unicorns are from the South. The GDP per person in the South is 4.2 times higher than the North. None of these indicators can be ignored by any central government, whatever the political compulsions, notes Ramesh Menon.
According to a report by the Association of Democratic Reforms, 59 per cent of the MLAs (or 141 MLAs out of 241) in the Bihar assembly have criminal records pending against them. Comparatively, the percentage of tainted legislators in the last assembly was 35 per cent
In 2019, an all-party meeting was held in Delhi and it was attended by 19 political parties to discuss critical reforms in governance. One of the subjects of the discussions was simultaneous elections
Thackeray had on Monday claimed his bag was inspected by the election authorities when he arrived in Maharashtra's Yavatmal to campaign for the November 20 assembly elections.
A freebie once granted can hardly be discontinued. All that can happen is to substitute it with a bigger freebie, notes A K Bhattacharya.
'There will be no khel on February 12 during the confidence motion vote.'
Taking a dig at a section of Bangladeshi politicians, who said the country has legitimate claims over Bengal, Bihar and Odisha, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday wondered whether Indians 'would have lollipop' when external forces would try to occupy Indian lands.
Maoist ultras have asked Bihar assembly Speaker Udai Narain Choudhary to present the 'hishab-kitab' (a complete account) of the work he has done in his constituency.Choudhary, the first Dalit Speaker of the Bihar assembly, is a legislator from the Maoist-infested Imamganj in Gaya district. The Maoists have threatened that they will not allow polls to be held in that area and urged people to boycott elections in the constituency.
Hailing the Bharatiya Janata Party's Delhi assembly polls victory as 'historic', Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday launched a stinging attack on the Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress, saying the country needs a serious political transformation and not politics of 'dhoort-ta (deceit) and moorkhta (foolishness)'.
Having emerged as a senior partner of the National Democratic Alliance in Bihar for the first time in nearly two decades, the Bharatiya Janata Party finally seems to have come out of the shadow of its allies in the state but new alliance arithmetic has dragged down their overall vote share since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Concerned over large gatherings during campaigning for the upcoming Bihar assembly elections and bypolls in several states amid the coronavirus pandemic, the Election Commission on Wednesday reduced the maximum number of 'star campaigners' for recognised national and state parties from 40 to 30.
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