Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other UDF MPs protest the arrest of Catholic nuns in Chhattisgarh, alleging religious persecution by the BJP government and demanding their immediate release.
With nominations for the first phase of Bihar elections closing soon, the INDIA bloc is struggling to finalize seat sharing, while the NDA has announced its candidates. Key political figures are actively campaigning.
Here is a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis of the ruling Congress in Chhattisgarh.
Against predictions by most exit polls that the ruling Congress had an edge in the state, the BJP banked heavily on the charisma of the PM.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has alleged that Chaitanya Baghel, son of former Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel, handled over Rs 1,000 crore worth of proceeds from a liquor scam and used Rs 16.7 crore for his real estate project.
Here is a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis of the ruling Congress in Chhattisgarh.
The arrest of two Catholic nuns from Kerala in Chhattisgarh on charges of human trafficking and forced religious conversion has ignited a political controversy, with opposition parties criticizing the arrest and the Chief Minister defending the police action.
State BJP chief Arun Sao confirmed the development and said the party was unable to contact Sai at present but it would make all efforts to clear any misunderstanding he has.
BJP state chief Rajeev Chandrasekhar stated that the arrest of two nuns in Chhattisgarh was due to a 'misunderstanding' and that they will be released on bail soon. He met with Archbishop of Trichur Andrews Thazhath to brief him that the Prime Minister and Union Home Minister have assured the nuns would be released on bail.
''The outcome of the state polls may lead to some strategy-related permutations and combinations and the markets may extrapolate it to the likely outcome in the general elections.'
'When you compare Bihar's poverty from its earlier times, then there is a huge difference. Things have improved a lot. And migration has played an important role in reducing poverty.'
In the first phase covering 20 of the total 90 assembly seats, 223 candidates, including 25 women, are in the fray and as per electoral rolls, 40,78,681 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise.
The voting for Madhya Pradesh's all 230 assembly seats was held on Friday, November 17, while Chhattisgarh voted in the second phase of the election.
Bypolls will be held on Wednesday in 31 assembly seats spread across 10 states and Kerala's Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency, from where Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is making her electoral debut. Though these bye-elections are not going to have any bearing on the governments, they are seen as a big test for the Congress and the INDIA bloc which failed to put up a united show in the recent Haryana assembly polls. Most of these seats fell vacant after the sitting MLAs contested the Lok Sabha elections and won while in some constituencies, the bypolls are being held due to death of the representatives. The Wayanad seat was vacated by Rahul Gandhi, who also won from the Rae Bareli parliamentary constituency which he kept. Voting will be held in seven seats in Rajasthan, six in West Bengal, five in Assam, four seats in Bihar, three in Karnataka, two seats in Madhya Pradesh, and one seat each in Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Kerala and Meghalaya. Votes will be counted on November 23.
A string of populist promises, including extension of the free ration scheme announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the Mahadev betting app issue and the Hindutva card are among key factors that have catapulted the Bharatiya Janata Party to power in Chhattisgarh after five years.
BJP-ruled states argued in the Supreme Court that governors and the President have autonomy in assenting to bills passed by state assemblies, asserting that courts cannot mandate assent.
Voting for 10 constituencies was held from 7 am to 3 pm in 10 seats and from 8 am to 5 pm in the rest 10 segments under a thick security blanket of police and paramilitary personnel in the Naxalite-hit Bastar division.
Single-phase voting was held in Mizoram on Tuesday, while 20 constituencies in Chhattisgarh voted in the first phase of assembly elections in the state.
A special court in Chhattisgarh's Bilaspur district granted bail to three persons, including two nuns from Kerala, arrested on charges of human trafficking and forced religious conversion.
In both of these Hindi heartland states, the straight contest between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Congress.
The current situation in Kerala politics is perhaps best described as a case of the state's traditional two front politics now seeing a third front (the BJP) muscling in with the potential outcome being either a messy three front affair or a renewed endorsement of the two front pattern but with one of the old fronts compromised or quashed, observes Shyam G Menon.
'China reduced its exports of urea to India gradually.' 'In 2020-2021 we imported 28 lakh tonnes of urea which reduced to 16 lakh tonnes in 2022-2023 and that has now reduced to 1 lakh tonnes in 2024-2025.'
The ruling Congress, voted to office in 2018 after 15 years in opposition, and the Bharatiya Janata Party are the main contenders for power in the state, where the Aam Aadmi Party, the Bahujan Samaj Party and some regional outfits are also in the fray.
The Congress leader, who resigned as the chief minister Sunday night, emerged victorious in the Patan assembly seat, defeating BJP candidate Vijay Baghel by 19,723 votes in the state assembly elections held last month.
Ahead of the Chhattisgarh Assembly elections last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Dongargarh, a popular pilgrimage spot, and met Acharya Vidyasagar Maharaj on November 5 and took his blessings.
The Bhupesh Baghel government in Chhattisgarh is trying to blame its legislators for its failures as eight MLAs have been dropped by the Congress in its first list of candidates for the assembly polls, state Bharatiya Janata Party chief Arun Sao claimed on Sunday.
The CMs with lowest assets are West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee with assets worth over Rs 15.38 lakh, Omar Abdullah, CM of Jammu and Kashmir, with assets worth over Rs 55.24 lakh, and Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, who has assets worth Rs 1.18 crore.
With the second list, the total number of candidates declared by the Congress went up to 83 out of the total of 90.
Vishnu Deo Sai, a prominent tribal face of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Chhattisgarh, will be state chief minister after he was elected as leader of Bharatiya Janata Party's legislative party during a meeting of 54 newly-elected MLAs in Raipur on Sunday.
It's a single phase polling in Mizoram while first phase of assembly elections is underway in Chhattisgarh.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and the tribal face of the party, Vishnu Deo Sai, on Wednesday took oath as the chief minister of Chhattisgarh, 10 days after the saffron party returned to power after a gap of five years by unseating Congress in the assembly elections.
The Maharashtra government plans to introduce a stringent anti-conversion law in the winter session of the legislature, with provisions stricter than those in other states.
The two tribal dominated divisions of Surguja and Bastar having 26 assembly seats that contributed hugely to the Congress' landslide victory in Chhattisgarh in 2018 have swung to the Bharatiya Janata Party this time.
The Bharatiya Janata Party swept Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh on Sunday inflicting a resounding defeat on the Congress to tighten its stranglehold in the Hindi heartland, setting the tone for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
The incident comes amid accusations by the opposition BJP of "targeted killings" of its workers in the run up to the polls.
Vishnu Deo Sai, a prominent tribal face of the Bharatiya Janata Party, will be the next chief minister of Chhattisgarh where the saffron party returned to power after a gap of five years following the recently-concluded assembly polls.
Charan Das Mahant, who is one of the star campaigners of the party, sparked controversy at a public rally in Rajnandgaon on Tuesday when he stated that they needed someone who could hold a stick and confront Modi.
A 'fake' cardiologist, Narendra Yadav alias Narendra John Camm, and a Bilaspur hospital have been booked for culpable homicide over the death of former Chhattisgarh assembly speaker Rajendra Prasad Shukla 19 years ago. Yadav, who was arrested over the death of seven patients after botched surgeries at a hospital in Damoh, Madhya Pradesh, had operated on Shukla at the private facility in Bilaspur, following which the ex-speaker died in 2006. Yadav's degree has been found to be fake, and his registration with the Indian Medical Council/Chhattisgarh Medical Council has not been traced. Police are investigating the case.
Rediff Labs analysed the 2013 assembly election results merged with 2014 Lok Sabha election results to develop a Sentiment Meter for the 2018 electoral battle in Chhattisgarh.
In 2022, Rajasthan met for 30 days, Chhattisgarh 18 days, MP and Mizoram for 15 each, and Telangana for 10 days.
