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 Supreme Court on Friday stayed the conviction of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in a 2019 defamation case over his Modi surname remark, restoring his status as an MP.
A group of Anna Hazare supporters on Friday protested outside the residence of Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi, shouting slogans in favour of the Gandhian and his demand for a strong Lokpal.
A day after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's comment that there was no United Progressive Alliance anymore, Kishor, who has earlier been political advisor to various parties, also called for democratically electing the opposition leadership.
Accusing Rahul Gandhi and the Congress of flouting the Model Code of Conduct, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday complained to the Election Commission over his remarks linking the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh to Mahatma Gandhi's killing and sought action against the Congress vice president and derecognition of the party.
"Rahul Gandhi is de facto Congress chief but he should become de jure" and make the party battle ready without waiting for anti-incumbency to build up against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, senior party leader Jairam Ramesh said.
'This is fake. Tyagi was made to sign on a blank paper of the register for media entry and later the names of Rahul Gandhi and others were added in the register,' Congress said.
The Telugu Desam Party, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam continued to raise the issue of the dam over the River Cauvery and special status for Andhra Pradesh in both the Houses. While the Rajya Sabha was adjourned for the day soon after it met at 11.00 am, the Lok Sabha saw repeated adjournments, but managed to pass the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill amid the din.
'There was trust, but perhaps there was also this apprehension that given the supreme post of prime minister, Sonia Gandhi felt her authority may be a challenged.'
It won't be wise old Modi versus an immature Pappu any longer. It will be Modi versus a whole collection of experienced Opposition leaders, predicts Vir Sanghvi.
HRD Minister Smriti Irani is likely to be the target of Opposition attack in Parliament where Rahul Gandhi will lead the Congress charge against the government on Tuesday.
Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam MP D N V Senthil Kumar on Wednesday apologised in the Lok Sabha for his controversial 'north-south divide' remark which had sparked a backlash.
The Parliamentary Ethics Committee, headed by veteran Bharatiya Janata Party leader Lal Krishna Advani, has issued a show-cause notice to Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi asking him to respond to questions on whether he had once declared himself a British citizen.
He also advised Congress chief Rahul Gandhi to "learn" from former defence minister Pranab Mukherjee "lessons on national security."
Thursday was the penultimate day of the Budget Session of Parliament. The second half of the session which began on March 5 has been a washout with no legislative business being transacted due to stalling of proceedings by the opposition.
The announcement put an end to speculation that Sonia Gandhi may not contest in the upcoming polls due to health reasons and the party's newly appointed general secretary in-charge (East UP) Priyanka Gandhi Vadra may be fielded from her constituency.
There was no official word on the agenda of the session which will be held days after the G20 Summit in the national capital on September 9 and 10.
What is the road ahead for Rahul Gandhi? Shehzad Poonawalla offers a blueprint.
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Rahul Gandhi's experiment of choosing Congress candidates for Lok Sabha polls through the 'primary' system appears to have suffered initial hiccups with two constituencies being dropped from the list of 16.
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.
'To lead the Congress party, you need experience.' 'You should have held some positions which give you the experience of running the party at any level.' 'Tharoor doesn't have any such experience.'
With the debacle in Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls coming as a shock to the Congress, Rahul Gandhi will be analysing the outcome at a meeting of party leaders here on April six in a move to set the house in order ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.
Gandhi's comments came at a time when the BJP is trying to distance itself from its erring MP.
The Haryana victory will be a morale booster for the Bharatiya Janata Party and increase its bargaining power in the Mahayuti's seat-sharing talks for the upcoming Maharashtra assembly elections, according to political analysts.
Gandhi asked the students whether 'Swachh Bharat Abhiyan' ('Clean India Mission') was working, to which most replied in a resounding 'yes'.
Three months after the Modi government withdrew SPG cover to Sonia, Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi, they are all set to lose another special status provided to them.
"It is about time that India and its institutions are protected from these 'institution wreckers'," said Jaitley.
Nath, 72, reached Bhopal late in night to be greeted with chants of 'Jai Jai Kamal Nath' by his supporters.
All MPs of the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, including nominated members, are entitled to vote in the vice presidential election.
The fate of the controversial ordinance against disqualification of convicted lawmakers appears sealed with Rahul Gandhi today slamming it as "complete nonsense" and which should be "torn up and thrown away".
'Blocking Parliament brings attention to a party that has poor speakers like Rahul Gandhi. It is unlikely to shine in debates, assuming we were a nation that enjoyed listening to sparkling intellectual exchange, which we are not.'
In a stinging attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party-led central government, Shiv Sena member of Parliament Sanjay Raut on Sunday said it wouldn't be surprising if the Enforcement Directorate issues summons against former prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru in the National Herald newspaper case and paste the notice on his memorial.
The current battle within the party is seen as setting the stage for August 10 when Sonia completes one year of interim presidentship, and questions are being raised about a leadership vacuum. For the first time, responsible quarters are suggesting that as Sonia cannot function as interim president indefinitely and Rahul seems to want power but not the responsibility, one way out is collective leadership, reports Aditi Phadnis.
Congress leader K C Venugopal and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's T R Baalu walked out of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh's office, refusing to endorse NDA candidate Birla without being offered the Deputy Speaker's position.
Waiting to be reinstated as a member of Parliament after his disqualification following conviction in a criminal case, Nationalist Congress Party leader Mohammed Faizal on Friday said the Lok Sabha secretariat was very quick to disqualify, as in his and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's case, but very slow to reinstate.
Some of the Congress's new-found enthusiasm for hitting the streets will show its result in the Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, and Karnataka elections. That is when we will know if the Congress will go to the regional parties or the parties will come to the Congress.
Asked about the organisational changes made by Gandhi and the subsequent reported statements by some leaders who had written to her over party reforms, Congress' chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said he had not seen a single statement by any Congress leader on the issue and cannot comment on that.
Only vegetarian dishes were served at the official dinner held at a state-run five-star hotel.
Former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, Bharatiya Janata Party ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and Prahlad Singh Patel, as also former election commissioner Ashok Lavasa and poll strategist Prashant Kishor were among those whose phone numbers were listed as potential targets for hacking through an Israeli spyware sold only to the government agencies, an international media consortium reported on Monday.
From Indian poet and philosopher Thiruvalluvar to English great William Shakespeare, Lok Sabha members quoted extensively from literature to put across their arguments as they raised the Manipur issue during a debate on the no-confidence motion over the past two days.
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