The 'Make Rahul Gandhi All India Congress Committee president again' chorus is growing louder in the Congress with half a dozen state units so far seeking his elevation to the top post, even as uncertainty and suspense persisted over whether he would take on the mantle.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress remain the most dominant political forces in Chhattisgarh, though the state has several regional outfits that have pockets of influence, while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is making a determined bid to challenge its well entrenched rivals and make a mark in polls to the 90-member House.
Parliament is set to witness heated debates on a range of issues like the NEET paper leak row, the Agnipath initiative and inflation when both houses reconvene on Monday.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Congress general secretary (communications) Jairam Ramesh said like other states, the BJP started the game of using money power, power of the government and muscle power to destabilise the Congress government in Himachal Pradesh but has failed.
There are concerns within the Congress with respect to the articulation of the party's demand for the caste census, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently accusing the grand old party of attempting to divide Hindus through its push for the Other Backward Classes.
Following the party's sweep of assembly elections in three Hindi heartland states against the odds, the BJP's brain trust is now busy game-planning as to how it can improve on its 2019 Lok Sabha election tally of 303 seats.
Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday urged the Election Commission to derecognise Congress as a national party, accusing it and its vice president Rahul Gandhi of repeatedly violating the model code of conduct.
The arrest was made following a police complaint lodged against him by Sameera Paikra, the BJP candidate from Marwahi constituency in the 2013 state assembly polls.
Campaigning ended on Wednesday evening for 102 Lok Sabha seats across 21 states and Union territories which will go to polls in the first phase on April 19 with top leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance and the opposition Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) making a last-gasp effort to woo voters.
'The strategy of frontal organisations of the Maoists is to create unrest and ensure that such unrest leads to a law and order problem.' 'To cover such acts it was necessary to bring in a different definition of unlawful activities which is different from the definition of unlawful activities in the UAPA.'
The BJP has fielded 18 MPs, including four Union ministers, for the latest round of assembly polls so far -- seven each in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan and four in Chhattisgarh.
Asked about the talk of a rift between him and Chief Minister Baghel during the tenure of the government in the last five years, Singhdeo said there were no differences as such.
Clad in white attire and red headgear with artificial Bison horns, Gandhi while beating a drum, roved and swayed around in circles with the tribals.
Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera tweeted, "Shayad meri tapasya mein kuch kami reh gayi (Maybe my penance fell short)."
The party's decision to announce the first list of candidates so early underlines the significance it has attached to five state elections, the last round of assembly contest before the all-important Lok Sabha polls.
The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) will get a 'decisive mandate' in the Lok Sabha polls and may take even less than 48 hours to decide on its prime ministerial pick, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said on Thursday, asserting that it stands to reason that the party which gets the maximum seats in the alliance will be a 'natural claimant' for its leadership.
The Enforcement Directorate, which has been investigating the Mahadev app-linked money laundering case for more than a year, alleged in the past that its probe has shown involvement of various high-ranking politicians and bureaucrats from Chhattisgarh, where the two main promoters of the app hail from.
Senior leader P Chidambaram whose Rajya Sabha tenure is ending from Maharashtra is under consideration from Tamil Nadu as the Congress is all set to get the support of alliance partner the DMK. The G-23 leaders, including Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma and Vivek Tankha, are also said to be in contention.
Electorally, the yatra seems to have paid dividends in the south, but the march does not seem to be helping the Congress in stopping the BJP's surge in the Hindi-heartland states.
Nine MLAs will be sworn in as ministers at the Raj Bhavan at 11:45am, Sai told reporters on Thursday.
Uppal, 43, was detained last week in that country and the ED authorities are in touch with the Dubai authorities to get him deported to India, they said.
The second phase of Rahul Gandhi's 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra' in Jharkhand, which was scheduled to commence on Wednesday, has been cancelled, a party official said.
'Rahul Gandhi is going to turn 54 and in India political leaders peak when they are around 60.' 'This 'bhai-behen ki jodi' has done a wonderful job for the Congress.' 'Priyanka Gandhi was a very effective campaigner.'
The stakes are significant for the BJP in this round as the party had in 2019 won an overwhelming majority of these seats, including all in Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, that will go to polls on May 7.
The results mark a defining turn in the fortunes of several regional satraps, especially in the BJP, around whom politics in their states have revolved for decades.
Congress leader Sachin Pilot on Thursday expressed happiness that the Congress party has taken cognisance of the issues raised by him about welfare of youth and corruption under the previous Vasundhara Raje government in Rajasthan, and asserted the party will contest the assembly polls unitedly to secure a massive victory.
Surprisingly, the BJP's nearest rival in ad spend was not the Congress, but the Bharat Rashtra Samithi.
The party was trounced in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh and is now left with only Himachal Pradesh in the north. It is ruling in only three states on its own and is in power in Bihar and Jharkhand as a junior partner in alliance with regional parties.
The 10 who put in their papers include nine Lok Sabha MPs, including Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar and Prahlad Patel, and the one Rajya Sabha member, officials said.
He held two massive roadshows in Rajasthan and one in Madhya Pradesh and his entries in many of rally venues were marked by a drive through cheering supporters.
'Every report I filed for Rediff.com on the professor's incarceration, would leave me wondering for days, at the depth of the State's malevolence towards this disabled professor, and his equally deep capacity to tolerate it,' recalls Jyoti Punwani.' 'No country in the world would do what our country was doing to someone so helpless.'
'The Congress can exist without (someone from) the Nehru-Gandhi family being its president.'
'Adivasi seats will sound the bugle of the end of the BJP regime in Gujarat.'
The Rediff Sentiment Meter calculates how the seats distribution is altered as sentiment towards the contesting political parties changes, through the use of wins and margins of victory from the 2008 Assembly elections.
Chhattisgarh Congress chief Charan Das Mahant has said he will "sweep the party office with a broom" if asked by Congress President Sonia Gandhi, inviting ridicule from the Bharatiya Janata Party, which called him a "sycophant" who considers his post as that of a "fourth grade" employee.
The Congress on Monday said a first information report (FIR) has been registered against Bharatiya Janata Party MPs Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and Subrat Pathak on its complaint related to a fake video of Rahul Gandhi, allegedly aimed at disturbing communal harmony.
With the party fielding three Union ministers, besides four other MPs, as candidates in the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls, it may continue with the strategy in Rajasthan.
There is little doubt that the prime minister's own charisma exceeds that of his party, but 2024 is proof that no party can ultimately depend on one person to deliver victory all the time, points out R Jagannathan.
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