Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Friday said his party would pull off a spectacular victory in the state assembly elections, but evaded a direct reply to a question whether he would be the chief minister for the fifth time, as he just said 'Bharatiya Janata Party Zindabad'.
Kanugolu had also made forays in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh following a directive from the party's central leadership but regional satraps Ashok Gehlot and Kamal Nath reportedly were not on the same page as the poll strategist.
Sources in the Raje camp said she would be meeting the party high command on Thursday.
Nath, 72, reached Bhopal late in night to be greeted with chants of 'Jai Jai Kamal Nath' by his supporters.
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 Congress leadership is caught in a peculiar situation and wants to find a middle path to the issue, party sources said.
Nath's fitness challenge comes in the wake of Chouhan, 62, repeatedly targetting him over his age and health, saying that he was resting in Delhi.
'...the Congress tally in 2028 would further plummet under 50.' 'A fresh face as CM would further strengthen the BJP and weaken the Congress in Madhya Pradesh.'
Springing a surprise, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday picked Mohan Yadav, a leader of Other Backward Classes (OBC) and a three-time MLA, as the next chief minister of Madhya Pradesh, state party president VD Sharma said.
With all 29 under its belt, the BJP became the first political party to achieve such a feat after 40 years in Madhya Pradesh.
However, in 950 booths, voting will end at 4 pm, though people standing in the queue at that time will be able to exercise their franchise.
Ahead of the last Assembly polls, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had promised to implement a farm loan waiver scheme in the state if the party came to power.
'Some locals suggested that a heated argument between a group of kanwariyas and flower sellers outside the temple may have triggered the incident'
Amid speculation that he may do yet another volte face and return to the National Democratic Alliance, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Saturday visited Buxar district, bordering Uttar Pradesh, to attend a function where senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Union Minister Ashwani Kumar Choubey was also present.
Balasore SP Sagarika Nath urged residents to stay indoors during the curfew period, emphasising that seven FIRs have been filed and 34 people detained on charges related to rioting since Monday.
The decision was taken to ensure the betterment of the state and the party in the days to come, senior leader Ratan Lal Nath told reporters shortly after Saha, the state BJP president, took oath as the new chief minister.
UP's representation in the government could diminish, given the BJP's decreased seat count in that state.
At least five people were killed in separate rain-related incidents on Tuesday in Bengaluru, which has been reeling under incessant rains for the past three days causing widespread flooding in several residential areas and turning roads into virtual rivers.
As many as nine Kanwariyas died and several others were injured when their vehicle came in contact with a high-voltage overhead wire in Bihar's Hajipur.
Bypolls to 28 assembly constituencies in the state will be held on November 3. In order to return to power in the state, the Congress has to win all 28 seats, while the ruling BJP only needs nine seats to reach the majority mark of 116 in the 230-member House.
Chief Minister-designate Mohan Yadav, an OBC leader and three-time Bharatiya Janata Party MLA, started his political career when he was a student and rose to become higher education minister of Madhya Pradesh where he announced to make Hindu epic Ramcharitmanas as an optional subject in colleges in 2021.
On Thursday, he broke a record which had been held by former Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh.
A number of high-profile electoral battles, starring veterans and debutants, formidable opponents and unlikely contestants, feature in Tuesday's outcome.
Three Congress MLAs -- Hardeep Singh Dang, Bisahulal Singh and Raghuraj Kansana -- are reportedly still untraceable.
The Congress on Saturday appointed 50-year-old Jitu Patwari, who belongs to the Other Backward Classes, as president of the party's Madhya Pradesh unit replacing veteran Kamal Nath.
"Nathji should take the moral responsibility for the defeat as he is chief minister and mostly importantly the state party chief as well," a Congress leader said.
A total of 45 MLAs voted in favour of the confidence motion in the 81-member assembly.
A fierce competition among parties to offer freebies and guarantees, a scramble for tribal, OBC, women votes and a touch of Hindutva -- all have combined to make the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls a high-stakes battle with main rivals BJP and the Congress pulling out all the stops to gain power.
Singh also defended Madhya Pradesh Congress chief Kamal Nath over the latter's comments on 'Hindu Rashtra.'
'The concept of an MP IPL team is the brainchild of Kamal Nath.' 'If the Congress government comes to power in the state, he will assemble an IPL team for MP with the assistance of his business contacts.'
Several social media users said that the red-bound Constitution is a coat pocket edition, which has been presented to top Indian leaders, including the President and the Union Home minister.
Nath said the silver bricks were bought from contributions made by members of the Congress. "We will send 11 silver bricks for the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya on the behalf of citizens of Madhya Pradesh," the former chief minister told reporters.
Imarati Devi, Tulsi Silawat, Govind Singh Rajput, Mahendra Singh Sisodiya, Pradyumn Singh Tomar and Prabhuram Chaudhari were removed from the cabinet with immediate effect on Friday, said a Public Relations Department official.
The ruling BJP stole a march on the Congress on Friday by releasing its first list of 177 candidates for the assembly polls.
The journalist's daughter, a post-graduate law student, had returned from London to Bhopal on March 18. She had been asked to observe home quarantine. But two days after her arrival, the journalist attended Kamal Nath's last press conference as the CM on March 20, official sources said.
Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Sunday night ordered the removal of the Sagar district collector, superintendent of police and sub-divisional magistrate following the deaths of nine children on Sunday, an official said.
President Droupadi Murmu, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar, Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud, Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi and several other famous faces were seen at polling booths, exercising their franchise in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha polls on Saturday.
Seventy-year-old Bharatiya Janata Party leader Manik Saha on Wednesday took oath as chief minister of the sensitive border state of Tripura.
Politicians across the political spectrum graced Radhika Merchant and Anant Ambani's wedding ceremonies at the Jio World Convention Centre at the Bandra Kurla Complex in north west Mumbai.
Tandon's fresh directive came two days after he first asked Nath to face a floor test on Monday, after commencement of budget session of the Assembly.
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