'I somehow felt that Muzaffar Ali was in Aligarh to feel the pulse of the Muslim youth, especially in the darker and harsher times that India is passing through,' notes Mohammad Sajjad.
Empty bottles of liquor were discovered inside the premises of the legislature in dry Bihar, in a fresh embarrassment to the Nitish Kumar government in the state, which has been drawing flak over recent hooch tragedies that have claimed more than 40 lives.
While the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Janata Dal-United are busy fighting each other, the BJP is trying not to repeat the mistakes it made the last time out, says Satyavrat Mishra
'Had these three farm laws existed it would have become a huge election issue.'
Narendra D Modi and his party campaigned in these elections uncharacteristically without any big ideas. Of course, winning each election at all costs could be a big idea as well, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Over 26 people have lost their lives country in the aftermath of the 7.9 magnitude earthquake in Nepal.
Modi also berated the Rashtriya Janata Dal-Congress combine in Bihar, calling it an alliance of "double-double yuvraj" (two crown princes) whose sole concern was to protect their "respective thrones".
The veteran socialist leader, who ended his long alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party last year, was responding to queries from journalists about the 'Hindu Rashtra' clamour, which was openly endorsed earlier this week by his Uttar Pradesh counterpart Yogi Adityanath.
'People may think that because my father was in the film world and politics, things are easy for me.' 'It is not easy at all.'
Former Bihar chief minister and Rashtriya Janata Dal chief Lalu Prasad Yadav's wife Rabri Devi lost the elections from Raghopur and Sonepur assembly seats from which she contested.
Most politicians and even non-politicians have been honoured because of what they were purported to be electorally worth for the ruling party of their time, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Talking about the brutal killing of Krishnaiah in 1994, G Uma Krishnaiah said her husband was killed for no fault of his.
'You can attack and conspire to weaken us, but you cannot destroy the Congress permanently.'
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.
From Chief Minister EK Palaniswami to Seeman to TTV Dhinakaran to elder brother M K Azhagiri, everyone's favourite target these days seems to the DMK chief Stalin, which is good news in an election year, but that doesn't mean he is going to sweep the polls, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
In the Interim Budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that a high power committee would be set up to consider the challenges arising from 'fast population grown and demographic changes.' 'But who wants data? It pays to feed people's fears, insecurities and apprehensions. If such fears don't exist, they must be created,' her husband Parakala Prabhakar says in this fascinating excerpt from his book, The Crooked Timber of New India: Essays on a Republic in Crisis.
"All your queries would be answered at an appropriate time," he told journalists.
'I will not say that the AIMIM is a 'B' team of the BJP. But due to the AIMIM, the BJP benefits for sure'
'Over the last 65 years the state has seen majority of Maratha chief ministers and cabinet ministers, even Union cabinet ministers.' 'The Marathas have always wielded disproportionately significant political, commercial and social influence in the state and yet they are asking for reservations today.'
'As general elections draw near, the BJP and the JD-U (in whatever form it is) will do a deal -- the state to the JD-U in return for support at the Centre for the BJP.'
More than predicting the nature of elections, a closer scrutiny of seat and vote share difference yields an important tool to assess the value of our democratic process, say economists Yugank Goyal and Arun Kumar Kaushik
Why are far right Hindu organisations growing in strength? Why is there a rising subscription to Neo-Wahabism, the Saudi Arabian version of contemporary Islam?
The Bihar unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party has invited party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi to contest from any Lok Sabha seat in Bihar, a senior leader said on Wednesday.
'What you need is a credible Opposition, a credible platform to persuade people to believe that it can replace this government.'
Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo Lalu Prasad Yadav has termed Wednesday's landslide victory of the National Democratic Alliance in the Bihar assembly polls as mysterious and also said that his party will review their defeat.
Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar on Thursday rejected claims by Bharatiya Janata Party MP and his former deputy chief minister Sushil Modi that the Janata Dal-United had split with the National Democratic Alliance as the chief minister was not made the Vice President.
The Bharatiya Janata Party will hold a month-long campaign staring from June to mark the first anniversary of the Modi 2.0 government and will hold digital rallies in all districts across the country, its general secretary Bhupendra Yadav said.
A revealing excerpt from Mani Shankar Aiyar's fascinating new book, The Rajiv I Knew.
In an interview with PTI, Chidambaram said the Congress has a 'unique position' in the ranks of the opposition parties but there was 'no need to talk about it now'.
BSP supremo Mayawati, AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee have been at the centre of intense debate in political circles on which way they will go after May 16, the day of election results.
'The upper caste elite's belief that they are casteless is a belief that is available only to the upper castes. Because all the lower castes are reminded by society every day what their caste is.'
The "lackadaisical attitude" of Bihar Police in handling the security at Narendra Modi's Patna rally, which was hit by multiple blasts, has peeved the home ministry as, even three days after the explosions, live bombs were found at the venue.
'We like to believe that it's the politicians who impose such bans. But it's the womenfolk of Bihar who made Nitish Kumar enact the ban,' says Ashis Nandy.
Why did Karnataka's economic prosperity fail to influence the nature of electoral promises made by political parties in the run-up to the assembly elections? asks A K Bhattacharya.
Aaditya Thackeray on Wednesday sought to distance himself from the strident "anti-migrant" stance that the Shiv Sena, founded by his late grandfather Bal Thackeray, has often been accused of.
Mishra was catapulted to the chief ministership of Bihar following the assassination of his elder brother Lalit Narayan Mishra in 1975.
Scindia, who is now with the BJP and took oath as a member from Madhya Pradesh, greeted his bete noire before taking oath. Scindia and Singh had differences that led to Scindia quitting the Congress. Scindia also greeted Congress leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Ghulam Nabi Azad.
Having put up a dismal show in the Bihar polls, Congress on Wednesday said it was a "tough time" for party politics in the state and that it will analyse why huge crowds in rallies of its top leaders could not translate into votes.
'In Bihar, the Dalits are not a consolidated socio-political constituency,' says Mohammad Sajjad.
Through the past decade, Bihar's revenue from liquor has quadrupled
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