Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel reshuffled his cabinet, inducting 19 new ministers and elevating Harsh Sanghavi to Deputy Chief Minister. The swearing-in ceremony took place on Friday, with several existing ministers continuing in their roles.
The ruling Congress suffered a setback in Andhra Pradesh on Thursday as three Members of the Legislative Assembly from the coastal region quit the party in protest against the bifurcation of the state.
Electoral fortunes of 1,302 candidates, including over half a dozen ministers in the Nitish Kumar government, will be sealed on Tuesday with 3.70 crore voters eligible to exercise their franchise across 122 assembly segments in the second and final phase of the Bihar polls.
The opposition INDIA bloc has declared RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav as its chief ministerial candidate for the upcoming Bihar assembly elections.
The RSS which catapulted Jagdeep Dhankar to national prominence after 21 years of hibernation could not come to his rescue when BJP higher ups decided to seek his resignation, points out Prakash Bhandari.
'The BSP does not agree with the policies of the Congress and the BJP, and therefore opposes their candidates. The party has issued a whip directing the MLAs to vote for the Independent candidate'
Several MLAs loyal to Gehlot, who was seen as the frontrunner for the post of Congress national president, had last week submitted resignation letters over a possible move to appoint Pilot as the next chief minister.
Members from the Jayant Chaudhary's Rashtriya Lok Dal too were part of the group, their participation seen as another indication that the party is all set to switch sides from the SP to the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah launched a scathing attack on Union Home Minister Amit Shah for his remarks on B.R. Ambedkar in Parliament. Siddaramaiah said Shah would have been a "Gujari" (scrap dealer) if there wasn't Ambedkar's Constitution. He also criticized Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar for not taking action against Shah for his comments. The Congress leader further accused the BJP and Sangh Parivar of hating Ambedkar and the Constitution. Siddaramaiah also recalled the RSS's opposition to the Constitution and Ambedkar in the past, citing articles from the RSS mouthpiece 'Organiser' and Golwalkar's book "Bunch of Thought."
The CM met M B Patil, a prominent Congress leader under whose leadership a section of dissatisfied MLAs have been holding meetings.
Eighteen Jharkhand Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs were suspended from the assembly till 2 pm of August 2 and were removed by marshals after they refused to leave the House on Thursday.
MNS chief Raj Thackeray has voiced strong opposition to the cutting of trees for the construction of a 'Sadhu Gram' in Nashik ahead of the Kumbh Mela, urging the government to reconsider the decision. Actor Sayaji Shinde has also joined the protest, threatening opposition if the government proceeds with the tree removal.
Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, D K Shivakumar, responding to several media queries regarding the current 'internal conflict' in Karnataka Congress in reference to the chief ministerial position, said on Tuesday that he doesn't want to embarrass or weaken the party.
Former chief minister ML Khattar also indicated the BJP government was not averse to a floor test and that six Jannayak Janta Party MLAs are with it.
Voting is underway for the second and final phase of the Bihar assembly elections across 122 constituencies. Key candidates and political dynamics are in focus as the state decides its next government.
Fifteen rebel members of Legislative Assembly belonging to Andhra Pradesh's ruling Congress and main opposition Telugu Desam Party were today disqualified for voting in favour of a no-confidence motion moved by TRS against the Kiran Kumar Reddy government in March this year.
'Without our support Nitish Kumar wouldn't have become chief minister.' 'After the government was formed we became ministers, but our agenda remained the same: Amit Shah had promised reservation for Nishads.' 'He wouldn't listen, so we went to UP and contested 52 seats in the 2022 elections. He didn't like the idea of rebellion.' 'He saw that this man, coming from Bombay, is very sharp. He's made four MLAs now, tomorrow he'll make 40. A time will come when they will make it 125.' 'They bought our MLAs and ousted us from the government.'
A stampede-like situation was witnessed on Monday outside 10, Circular Road, the bungalow allotted to the RJD supremo's wife Rabri Devi, a former CM, when the couple returned from Delhi, where they had appeared before a court.
The BJP's MoSha leadership are past masters in encouraging defections from their allies if it helped their party capture the chief minister's chair. In Bihar, they are not sure if JD-U MPs and MLAs would be willing to cross over to the BJP if the Nitish leadership came on top -- and the NDA crossed the halfway mark together, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Congress MLAs will likely to leave for Jaipur from Bhopal on Wednesday.
A video purportedly of a meeting of the Congress MLAs loyal to Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has surfaced.
'This will be a close election. At least now, it appears that the NDA has an edge.'
Women workers of the NDA in Bihar enforced a bandh to protest alleged abuse directed at PM Modi's mother during a Congress event. Protests were held across the state, with BJP leaders participating in sit-ins.
They cited the lack of trust in the leadership of O Ibobi Singh and said that due to him, the Congress failed to form the government even when it was the single largest party in the state.
'How can just 25 of us indulge in fisticuffs when there were more than 100 MLAs of the TMC in the House?'
BJP Meghalaya in-charge Chuba Ao said the party's 'Congress mukt campaign' is valid for the state and hence the party will seek clarification from the chief minister.
'In times of adversity, families unite, but the reverse is happening in the Lalu family.'
Most of them said 'everything is fine' in the state Congress after landing at the airport in Raipur in a special aircraft.
Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha's power to nominate five members to the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly was at the centre of a political and legal debate on the eve of vote count, with the Congress and regional parties the National Conference and the People's Democratic Party on Monday opposing any such move during government formation.
He said a volcano is waiting to erupt in Cong-JD(S) alliance.
Nitish thought that his stakes as chief minister were far greater than his stakes in protecting one of his party MLAs. He could not allow his rule-of-law train to be derailed by a small rock on the track. On the contrary, if he removed it to keep the train moving at a steady speed he would gain strong public admiration and sympathy that would help him take the masses along in carrying out other tasks. A fascinating excerpt from Arun Sinha's Nitish Kumar And The Rise Of Bihar.
Ahead of the Madhya Pradesh elections, Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs from Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Maharashtra have arrived in Bhopal as part of the ruling party's programme wherein every legislator will be allotted one assembly seat each that they are supposed to visit to take stock of the ground situation, party leaders said.
Who will take over the mantle of the Congress in Andhra Pradesh? This is the big question in the event of the death of charismatic leader Dr Y S Rajashekhara Reddy.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday sprang surprises with its first list of 71 candidates for the Bihar assembly polls, denying a ticket to Speaker Nand Kishore Yadav, a seven-term MLA, while fielding Deputy CM Samrat Choudhary in a direct election after over a decade.
uring the meeting at the Cecil Hotel in Shimla, discussions were being held and feedback taken from MLAs, sources said.
Maharashtra minister Manikrao Kokate was shifted from the agriculture ministry to the sports and youth welfare department in a late-night reshuffle. Dattatrey Bharne will be the new agriculture minister. The reshuffle comes after Kokate faced controversy for playing online rummy during a legislative council session and allegedly equating farmers with beggars.
The Congress had taken action against them on July 17 after three audio tapes allegedly pertaining to the conspiracy to topple the government surfaced.
Amid the ongoing impasse over the swearing-in of two newly elected Trinamool Congress MLAs, Speaker Biman Banerjee on Thursday summoned a special session of the West Bengal Assembly and asserted that the functioning of the House is not solely dependent on the Governor.
The resignation of Balwantsinh Rajput (who was also the chief whip), Tejashreeben Patel and Prahlad Patel reduced the Congress's tally to 54 in the 182-seat assembly.
In its second list of 46 candidates, the grand old party has also named four Muslim candidates.
