From steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal to billionaire Sunil Bharti Mittal's Airtel, Anil Agarwal's Vedanta, ITC, Mahindra and Mahindra, and a lesser-known Future Gaming and Hotel Services were among the prominent buyers of the now-scrapped electoral bonds for making political donations.
After the joint opposition protests at Jantar Mantar, Gandhi drove with Pawar to the latter's 6, Janpath residence.
India has seven recognised national parties - Congress, BJP, BSP, CPI, CPI-M, NCP and AITC.
The last time when more than 200 MLAs were part of the state government was in 1972, but at that time all the 222 legislators belonged to Congress. Also, the strength of the House was 270 at that time, a former state legislature official said on Monday citing data.
The Sena-BJP combine was tipped to capture three other cities while Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party may bag four towns.
Of the total 48 Lok Sabha seats in the state, the two parties have agreed on 42 seats, said Manikrao Thakre, president of the Congress' state unit, adding that talks over the remaining six seats were still inconclusive.
Strengthening the party's communication strategy to improve public engagement is foremost on the Congress agenda after Rahul Gandhi had stressed that they "have to go back to the people" at the Udaipur meeting.
The motive behind the killing was yet to be ascertained and various angles were being investigated, including the alleged link to the Lawrence Bishnoi gang, according to police.
In contrast, NCP president Sharad Pawar has indicated that he was ready for a pre-poll tie-up with the Congress.
Several opposition MPs, who had previously criticized former Rajya Sabha chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar, are now praising him following his sudden resignation, with some even requesting him to reconsider.
The assembly polls in Maharashtra will be held in a single phase while Jharkhand polls will be held in two phases, the Election Commission of India announced on Tuesday.
The assembly polls were fought under Eknath Shinde's leadership and it is now up to the Bharatiya Janata Party's central leadership to decide on how to maintain his stature, the caretaker Maharashtra chief minister's aide and former state minister Deepak Kesarkar said on Monday.
"I am putting efforts to get the Opposition together. I am not in the race to become the prime minister as I am not contesting the next (Lok Sabha) election," he told reporters.
Candidates from the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) opposition alliance in Maharashtra have decided to seek verification of the EVM-Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trails (VVPATs) units in their segments, following their defeat in the recent assembly polls. The move comes after several losing candidates, including those from the Shiv Sena (UBT), alleged that the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) might have been tampered with. The MVA, comprising the Shiv Sena (UBT), Congress, and NCP, lost to the Mahayuti coalition, which includes the Shiv Sena, BJP, and NCP. The MVA candidates are seeking verification based on a Supreme Court ruling that allows for checking the burnt memory/microcontroller in 5% of EVMs after the announcement of results.
Maharashtra Congress leader and Union Heavy Industries Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh on Monday side stepped the Padamsinh Patil issue, saying it is an internal matter of the NCP.He was responding to a question on whether Patil should resign from the Parliament, in the wake of his arrest by the Central Bureau of Investigation, in a murder case.The matter is subjudice and the law will take its own course, Deshmukh said.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday said that the Congress is ready to discuss issues with nationalist Congress Party issues that concern them even as Congress President Sonia Gandhi declined comments on the stand-off with the coalition partner.
Sri Lanka's National People's Power of President Anura Kumara Dissanayake on Friday swept the parliamentary elections by winning a two-thirds majority, and also dominating the Jaffna electoral district -- the heartland of the nation's Tamil minority.
The Nationalist Congress Party would not ally with the Congress in the north-east for the Lok Sabha polls, its senior leader Purno Agitok Sangma said in Shillong on Monday.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has accused Congress leader Gaurav Gogoi's British wife of collecting intelligence documents on behalf of the Pakistani climate lobby. Sarma claims to have documentary evidence of Gogoi and his wife's ties with Pakistan and will reveal everything publicly by September 10. Gogoi has denied the allegations, calling them a "C-grade Bollywood movie" and stating that he has only visited Pakistan once 12 years ago. Sarma alleges that Gogoi's wife, Elizabeth Colburn, worked for the climate lobby and had a close relationship with Pakistan.
Mumbai police had arrested Gurmail Baljit Singh (23), a resident of Haryana and Dharmaraj Rajesh Kashyap (19), from Uttar Pradesh, whereas there one aide, who was at the spot during the firing, fled from the spot.
Upping the ante, sulking Nationalist Congress Party on Tuesday warned the Congress that if its demands like a coordination committee for the United Progressive Alliance coalition and better treatment of allies were not resolved by Wednesday, it would pull out from the government.
'This is injustice to Shinde. Are they trying to say that he is not good enough to be the CM?'
The NCP has already put its claim on Deputy CM's post while the Congress Legislature Party will meet later in the evening to elect their leader.
The BJP and Shiv Sena, which along with Ajit Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party comprise the ruling Mahayuti, for some time now have been courting Thackeray, who founded the MNS in 2006.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis has attributed the recent state assembly election victory to the role of Hindutva and counter-polarization. He described BJP's Hindutva as a way of life and said it played an important role in mobilizing voters. Fadnavis also alleged that the opposition alliance had an agreement to withdraw riot cases against Muslims. He further commented on PM Modi's inclusive Hindutva and the increased voter turnout in the election.
Maharashtra's caretaker Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, who took ill at his native village in Satara district, is recovering and will return to Mumbai on Sunday evening, an associate said.
As a fallout of the dissolution of the administrative board of Maharashtra State Co-operative Bank by the Reserve Bank of India, the Nationalist Congress Party is eager to teach its ally, Congress, a lesson.
Maharashtra Minister Dhananjay Munde has appealed against an interim order by a magistrate directing him to pay maintenance to a woman who claims to be his first wife. Munde, a leader of the NCP, maintains he was never married to Karuna Munde, who filed the case. The appeal argues the magistrate's order was erroneous and that the relationship between Munde and Karuna was personal, not marital. The court adjourned the matter to March 21, and Karuna Munde has agreed not to apply for execution of the interim maintenance order until then.
Sri Lanka is facing 'a very serious crisis' that makes India naturally worried, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar told an all-party meeting in New Delhi on Tuesday and dismissed suggestions about such a situation arising in India.
'If we want to defeat the anti-secular forces, then all of us should put aside our differences to form a compact alliance,' the Congress chief said.
Shiv Sena-Uhhav Balasaheb Thackeray leader Sanjay Raut on Saturday said the seat-sharing talks between his party and the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party-Sharadchandra Pawar have concluded as these two parties are driven by a desire and mindset to resolve issues.
The Shiv Sena leader also asserted that Eknath Shinde will take any position in the Union cabinet as his interest lies in Maharashtra politics.
The reality is that far from being friendless, India is better positioned in the world than at any point post-Cold War, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
A Bharatiya Janata Party office-bearer from Shirur in Maharashtra's Pune district has sought the removal of Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar and his Nationalist Congress Party from the ruling alliance, which also consists of Chief Minister Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena.
A day after the Nationalist Congress Party demanded 50 per cent share of the seats in Maharashtra and a national alliance with the party, the Congress said it would sit together with its alliance partner to find a solution."Let me assure you that nothing is going to change the basic fact that we are fully capable of sitting together and finding an amicable solution," party spokesman Abhishek Singhvi said.Singhvi said the party's relationship with NCP was long standing.
In signs of friction in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) over the chief minister's post, Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray leader Sanjay Raut on Friday said ally Congress should understand his party's contribution in increasing the grand old party's tally in the Lok Sabha polls.
Bhujbal stridently opposed Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange's demand for Maratha quota from the Other Backward Classes (OBCs) share.
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