Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah will soon get around to reworking their organisational set-up and administrative priorities to regain lost ground in the wake of the Delhi electoral debacle, but there's third course available to them as well. That is to introduce the presidential form of government, which prime ministers Indira Gandhi and A B Vajpayee flirted with before abandoning it. Will Modi go further than them? N Sathiya Moorthy analyses the scenario.
A decision on this could be taken before Christmas, which might not necessarily result in a formal announcement as that could be delayed till the next year, people familiar with her thinking process said.
Emerging from a meeting with UPA presidential candidate Pranab Mukherjee in Kolkata on Monday, Congress MPs Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Deepa Dasmunshi lashed out at the TMC for "spreading canards" against Sonia Gandhi and Pranab Mukherjee and demanded immediate severance of all ties with the party.
'More than losing Bengal, the worry for their national leadership is the current crisis.' 'If people perceive that the government does not do enough, then there's trouble.'
'Rahul Gandhi has personally paid a heavy price for this character assassination and remorseless ridiculing and the Congress, of course, has been demolished politically.'
Speculation is rife that Bihar's ruling Janata Dal-United is likely to support the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance's choice for the upcoming Presidential poll. This ties in with Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar's refusal to attend the meeting of non-BJP parties called by Congress president Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi on May 26. The meeting will discuss the presidential polls and the way ahead for the opposition to tackle the BJP.
Led by Democratic Congressman Jamie Raskin, a battery of his party colleagues from the House of Representatives alleged that Trump incited his supporters for violence on January 6 as they stormed the Capitol Hill wherein Congressmen and Senators were performing their constitutional duty of counting and certification of the November 3rd presidential election results.
Kumar, a Dalit, as its candidate for president against NDA's nominee Ram Nath Kovind.
The US president had in past expressed dismay with the $2.3 trillion package that Congress passed Monday, which includes $900 billion in coronavirus relief and $1.4 trillion to fund the government until October, conflating the two bills and saying the spending goals were misguided.
The mispronunciation outraged a large number of Harris' supporters and her spokesperson Sabrina Singh said, "I'll keep it simple: If you can pronounce 'former' Senator David Perdue, you can pronounce 'future' Vice President Kamala Harris."
Comey is scheduled to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday.
India will either have to create a system in which certain geographical areas will wind up being permanent political outsiders at the Union level or it will have to create a system in which certain votes are weighted more heavily than others, observes Mihir S Sharma.
'This is not who we are. What we are seeing is a small number of extremists dedicated to lawlessness'
BJP claimed close to 116 lawmakers from rival parties appeared to have voted for Kovind.
They are likely to meet Sitaram Yechury following the meeting with Gandhi.
"I seek support of all legislators and I ask them to vote for me by exercising their conscience just as Indira Gandhi did in a Presidential election," he said.
United Progressive Alliance on Wednesday projected a united picture on the eve of the Presidential poll with all constituents including Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress and supporting parties attending a lunch hosted by Congress chief Sonia Gandhi.
The map showed all the countries, including water bodies and Antarctica, coloured red, with the exception of the state of California, India, Mexico, Liberia, Cuba and China coloured blue -- the hue of the Democratic party. However, while India was coloured blue, Jammu and Kashmir and the North-East states were coloured red.
A page called 'My First Vote For Modi' accounts for the largest number of ads by number (2,765). Another one called 'Bharat Ke Mann Ki Baat' was second (2,429). 'Namo Supporters' was third with 2,153 ads, reports Sachin P Mampatta.
'To those who wreaked havoc in our Capitol today, You did not win. Violence never wins. Freedom wins. And this is still the people's house.'
Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh has said that anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare is a mask of all anti-Congress parties and Bharatiya Janata Party intends to put up the social activist as its presidential candidate.
In a surprise statement, Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said the Congress has announced that Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee is not their Presidential candidate, comments that came shortly after a Congress spokesperson suggested he is too "valued" to be spared.
Political observer Dilliwala will talk about why this Presidential elections are all important and just who will get the job in the end.
This is something that Modi's critics are reluctant to accept: He is the most popular leader that India has seen since Indira Gandhi, says Vir Sanghvi.
In a major policy speech on the coronavirus in his home state of Delaware, Biden on Friday flayed US President Donald Trump for his policies to combat the coronavirus pandemic that has killed over 220,000 people and has had a devastating impact on the country's economy.
A bill to modify the list of scheduled castes in Tamil Nadu by grouping of seven castes which presently exist as separate castes, was passed by the Lok Sabha on Friday.
Like in the Presidential election, Trinamool Congress, which sought to put a spanner in the UPA choice of Pranab Mukherjee, plans to convey its preference for Gandhi at a meeting of the UPA constituents on the issue on Saturday.
The United States has made it clear to India that it is "discouraging" it from proceeding with its acquisition of S-400 missile defence systems from Russia but Washington will have to weigh "important geostrategic considerations" while taking a decision on growing calls for a presidential CAATSA waiver to New Delhi, President Joe Biden's nominee for Coordinator for Sanctions Policy has told lawmakers.
The Republican-majority Senate voted 52-48 to acquit him of abuse of power and 53-47 to acquit him of obstruction of Congress, thus preventing the Democratic move to overthrow him, for which they required two-thirds of votes in the 100-member House.
His comment came after the Shiv Sena attacked him for petitioning the president to save Mumbai blast convict Yakub Memon from the gallows.
Suspense mounted on Monday over the stand of two crucial United Progressive Alliance allies -- Trinamool Congress and Samajwadi Party -- over the Presidential poll for which the Election Commission is expected to announce a date shortly. At the heart of the strategy of Trinamool and SP is their clamour for a financial package from the Centre, but the Congress dismissed any possibility of a quid pro quo between any help to states and the Presidential poll.
A meeting of the Trinamool Congress parliamentary party has been convened in New Delhi on August six to finalise party's stand on the vice-presidential election slated for August seven.
'This year felt different -- and was different.' 'For the first time, the Indian American voter seemed to matter.'
Kumar thanked the leaders of 17 opposition parties, including Congress president Sonia Gandhi, for fielding her.
The results will be declared on July 20 in New Delhi.
With P A Sangma staying in the Presidential fray, the Congress on Wednesday said the contest was part of democracy but it would not pose a problem for Pranab Mukherjee who is sure to become the President.
Given Modi's penchant for springing a surprise, the BJP nominee for next President could be anyone. The only thing certain is that it will be an RSS person, reports R Rajagopalan.
With A P J Abdul Kalam opting out of the Presidential race on Monday, Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee, who proposed his name, would take a decision on it.
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.
These measures are in addition to other proposals made earlier, including regulation of sale and consumption of liquor, free trips to certain religious places like Sabarimala and distribution of one lakh cows every year.
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