The Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday pulled off a stunning performance in Maharashtra winning a record number of seats to propel the party-led ruling Mahayuti alliance to a landslide victory while the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) stormed back to power in Jharkhand on the back of a spectacular showing by the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin has announced the formation of a panel headed by a retired Supreme Court judge to study the relationship between the Union and state governments and ensure state autonomy. The panel, which will submit its interim report in January 2026 and its final report in two years, will examine the transfer of subjects from the State List to the Concurrent List, citing the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) as an example of a subject outside state purview.
Recalling Singh as a very humble person, Kumar said, "Dr Singh used to live here. I was a child when his family shifted out. It was a very nice family." The house where the Singh family lived is in a dilapidated state now as no one stays there since they moved out a long time ago, Kumar said.
Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Friday suggested the Opposition needs to come together and strengthen the alliance.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has expressed concerns about the Congress party's leadership role within the INDIA bloc, raising questions about their ability to justify their position. Abdullah highlighted a sense of disquiet among some allies, who feel the Congress isn't doing enough to earn its leadership position. While praising Sonia Gandhi's leadership, he also criticized the alliance's lack of consistent engagement and called for more structured communication to address potential disagreements. Abdullah's comments suggest underlying tensions within the opposition alliance, particularly regarding the Congress's electoral performance and seat distribution strategies.
Census exercise with caste enumeration will be carried out with the reference date of October 1, 2026, in snow-bound areas like Ladakh and of March 1, 2027, in the rest of the country, the Home Ministry announced on Wednesday.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday said that the society and country would progress only when maximum people get education for which the United Progressive Alliance government has taken concrete steps.
The clarification came amid a demand, including from Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, that the landslide tragedy in Kerala's Wayanad be declared a national disaster.
Archana Patil, the daughter-in-law of senior Congress leader and former Union home minister Shivraj Patil joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Saturday ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
He drew the roadmap of India's economic reform, unshackled it from the licence raj and pulled it back from the brink when even its gold reserve was pledged.
The opposition parties on Sunday slammed the move to hire public servants through lateral entry, claiming it will snatch reservations from SCs, STs and OBCs, but the Bharatiya Janata Party hit back stating the National Democratic Alliance government was bringing transparency to this mode of recruitment started by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance.
The central agency which is often accused, by parties opposed to the BJP, of having become a political instrument in the hands of the party ruling the Centre, has reopened inquiry into a case against Prasad which it had closed last year.
'They want to keep the pot boiling all the time.' 'The BJP wants to set a political narrative that the Gandhis are doing wrong things.'
Union minister Chirag Paswan has caused a flutter by stating he would choose to give up his ministerial berth instead of a compromise on his principles, in keeping with the precedent set by his late father Ram Vilas Paswan.
Former Union minister and Congress' Lok Sabha candidate from Ratlam in Madhya Pradesh, Kantilal Bhuria, who has courted a controversy with his 'two wives' remark, has clarified that he passed the comment sarcastically in response to a tribal man's query.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said Parliament's Monsoon session is like a 'Vijay Utsav' as the Indian armed forces achieved their objectives under Operation Sindoor 100 per cent, and expressed confidence that the MPs will articulate this sentiment in one voice.
'Wait for 2019, there will be no space for the BJP in UP.'
Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar on Sunday asked the Congress to rethink on its decision of not having an alliance with United Progressive Alliance partners at the national level.
The Congress on Monday announced its alliance with the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam would continue for Lok Sabha polls, setting at rest speculation about the future of the tie-up in the wake of All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's overture to the lead United Progressive Alliance party.
The CPI-M leader was fluent in Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Bangla, and also Malayalam. He was also well-versed in Hindu mythology, and often used those references in his speeches especially to attack the BJP.
Political pundits unanimously suggest that the state is not experiencing a discernible Gandhi wave this time around.
"The Congress is on cloud nine after a little success of the United Progressive Alliance government. It was achieved not on its own but with the help of its alliance partners. As a result, they are trying to create a leadership like Indira Gandhi with all the powers centred around one person," said an editorial in Marathi 'Congresscha Nakli Atmavishwas aani Agami Nivadnuka' (The fake confidence of Congress and the forthcoming elections) in NCP's mouthpiece Rashtrawadi.
The no-confidence notice moved by 6 Congress parliamentarians against the UPA government on the Telangana issue has found favour with 84 more Seema-Andhra leaders.
Moderate turnout was recorded in the first four hours of polling across five assembly constituencies across Punjab, West Bengal, Gujarat and Kerala where bypolls are underway on Thursday.
A crucial meeting of the Nationalist Congress Party is being held on Monday afternoon in the wake of the standoff with the Congress that has seen the United Progressive Alliance constituent deciding to pull out of the government.
Amidst speculation that his party might withdraw outside support to United Progressive Alliance, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav launched a tirade against Congress accusing it of being "cheat and clever" and taking the people for a ride.
The Congress in Maharashtra is making all efforts to woo the Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena to back United Progressive Alliance nominee Pranab Mukherjee for the presidential poll on Thursday.
The resignation also signals a continuing saga of unaddressed concerns of young leaders, once considered close to former Congress president Rahul Gandhi.
It is unfortunate that the Congress has taken a decision of contesting the elections in alliance with the JMM without even consulting allies in the UPA government, he said.
Former Union Law Minister Ashwani Kumar has argued for replacing the existing collegium system for judicial appointments, asserting that public sentiment leans toward an alternative mechanism, potentially resembling the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC). He believes that the government has the authority to propose a revised constitutional amendment for judicial appointments that would withstand judicial scrutiny. Kumar also urged the Supreme Court to establish a robust internal process to address concerns within the judiciary, including allegations against judges.
The stand-off between Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party came to an end on Wednesday with the decision to set up a Coordination Committee to address the grievance of the United Progressive Alliance ally from Maharashtra about not having a proper say in the functioning of the government.
Marshall Bouton, council president, in an online interview said that over the last couple of years, the Indian government had been 'hamstrung' by its alliance with Left in pushing economic reforms further.
China and Pakistan are in a tight strategic alliance. India must deal with them one at a time, but be prepared in case they decide to collude, points out Shekhar Gupta.
As the United Progressive Alliance led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh completes three years in power, Singh alleged that it is 'faceless, directionless and spineless'.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party losing Biju Janata Dal as an ally in Orissa, the Congress on Monday gloated over the plight of its principal challenger alleging National Democratic Alliance was "virtually non-existent" and there was "no serious challenge" to the United Progressive Alliance in the Lok Sabha polls.
Soon after meeting, Raut hinted at a pre-poll alliance with the Congress in UP and Goa, stating that the parties are thinking of working together in both the states that are scheduled to go to assembly polls early next year.
National Democratic Alliance on Saturday lambasted the United progressive Alliance government for its decision to hike diesel prices every month and said a meeting of alliance partners would be convened to chalk out a strategy to be adopted during the upcoming Budget Session of Parliament on price rise.
'How come?', 'why now?', 'what next?' Rediff.com's Krishnakumar Padmanabhan answers all your questions on the DMK-Congress drama!
Yoga guru Ramdev on Saturday alleged that Congress was responsible for large-scale corruption since independence and it must be thrown out of power in the interest of the country.
"We have enough human resource and a diplomat told me that 21st century's Saudia Arabia, with its rich human resource, is India," the Nerhu-Gandhi scion said in his eight-minute speech.
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