Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy on Friday submitted his resignation following the defeat of the ruling Congress-led UDF in the assembly election and attributed "false propaganda" against his government among the reasons that led to the debacle.
At the best of times, ticket distribution in India's political parties is a tough business. The post-election result has to be judged, and judged correctly. It's an impossible job in view of the 814 million voters for whom the party bigwigs have to perform. Sheela Bhatt presents this light-hearted assessment of what's top of the mind for our political heavyweights.
'Mamata Banerjee was an anti-body that the people of West Bengal needed to throw the CPI-M out. Though the disease is no more, we are suffering the anti-body. It is a punishment for the people of this state.' BJP leader Tathagatha Roy lashes out at the West Bengal chief minister.
In the unlikely event of the BJP-NDA losing all five states going to the polls in February-March, the Presidential electoral college numbers could be significantly altered, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Major Ports Authority Bill, 2020 was passed through ballot votes in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday with 84 votes in its favour and 44 against it. The Lok Sabha had passed the bill on September 23 last year.
The 'kiss of love' protest held in Kochi on Sunday has sparked a spat between Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Pinarayi Vijayan and Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala over the handling of the situation by the police.
'Congress is on the defensive about scams and corruption charges... The media is against the UPA.... The Nehru family is not just another family; it is a national wealth,'Kerala Chief Minister Oomen Chandy tells Rediff.com's Shobha Warrier.
Four teenaged sportswomen, who were undergoing training at Sports Authority of India's, Water Sports Centre in Alapuzha, Kerala, attempted suicide on Wednesday afternoon.
'The BJP will take time to come to power in Andhra.'
10 central trade unions have called a nationwide shutdown against 'anti-worker policies' of the central government. Apart from being successful in Bengal, Kerala and NE states, the bandh has also got support from Cong leader Rahul Gandhi and Shiv Sena in Maharashtra.
The director general of police said everyone in the force should have to perform their duties irrespective of their religion and politics.
Trains were set afire and blocked, and public vehicles attacked as protests over 'Agnipath' swept across several places in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Jammu on Thursday amid partisan political voices in favour and against the new recruitment scheme for the defence forces that has set off a firestorm.
"For the entire opposition, the job number one is to defeat Mr Narendra Modi and save Democracy and the Constitution."
Awful religious practices need to be abolished. But through social and political reformers, not by courts, argues Shekhar Gupta.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said that Mamamta is busy fighting with the poll panel instead of taking on political parties.
CPM politburo member Hannan Mollah said the party is facing one of the toughest situations following its defeat in Tripura, which has "forced us to rethink in a new way".
70-plus years after Independence, 'Hindu India, metamorphosised as 'Hindutva India', is proving the British right -- and for all the wrong reasons. Mohan Bhagwat should have answers for the why of it, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The bench will be headed by Justice N V Ramana and also comprise Justices S K Kaul, R Subhash Reddy, B R Gavai and Surya Kant.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has taken full advantage of the anger of the people against Congress and its policies and complete absence of a non-Congress, non-Bharatiya Janata Party alternative in the Lok Sabha polls, Left parties said on Friday.
Bindu and Kanakadurga, who broke centuries-old tradition by entering the holy shrine, said there were no objections from the devotees and called those who were protesting riot-mongers.
As polling begins on Friday for the remaining 25 Rajya Sabha seats in six states, here's a list of some of the bigwigs who are seeking to be elected to the Upper House of Parliament.
Mohammad Salim cited a news magazine which quoted Singh as reportedly saying -- after Narendra Modi and BJP's victory last year -- that India had the first "Hindu ruler after 800 years."
'The Modi government is about privatising profits and nationalising losses.'
In a change of stand, days after resenting police action against student editors over campus magazines containing remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Kerala Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala on Thursday said though the government respected freedom of expression, it was not proper to depict a person in any manner.
'Like it or not, the Congress is still the only party with the potential to challenge the BJP at a pan-Indian level,' says T V R Shenoy.
New Union minister L Murugan's declaration of Kongu Nadu as his native place, instead of Tamil Nadu, may be part of a grand BJP strategy to create new states out of existing ones, particularly those that have anti-BJP governments, mulls N Sathiya Moorthy.
The term of the Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura legislative assemblies is ending on March 6, March 13 and March 14 respectively.
'In the long term, the party that is going to be irrelevant is the Left.' 'It seems absurd that the people of Kerala are the last ones to wake up to the reality that this kind of discredited dogmatic ideological politics has no place in the modern world.'
Will appeasement, rising unemployment and her dictatorial style become major obstacles in her path? asks Payal Singh Mohanka.
Here is a closer look at politicos who have emerged victorious in the electoral contest of five state assemblies.
As the situation went out of control, police first used water cannon and then burst tear gas shells to disperse the unruly crowd.
A minor fire followed by smoke at the venue of Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy's mass contact programme held here amid tight security gave tense moments to police and other officials on Friday.
The finance minister's Budget presentation is a sombre affair, yes, but it wasn't as if the Lok Sabha was all serious through the speech.
Eleven persons, three of them local Communist Party of India-Marxist functionaries, were sentenced to life imprisonment in the sensational T P Chandrasekharan murder case by a special court in Kozhikode on Tuesday.
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