The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday unveiled its manifesto for the West Bengal elections, promising to build a 'Sonar Bangla' by providing employment, strengthening social security schemes and vowing to clear the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act in the first cabinet meeting of the new government.
'This is the vote against the Congress's Muslim appeasement policy. The OBCs in Uttar Pradesh has understood how the Congress to gain Muslim votes wants to give away a pie of the quota, which is legitimately theirs.'
Banerjee also alleged that the BJP is manipulating electronic voting machines to increase its vote share.
Singing of the national song in the Mantralaya or secretariat on the first working day of every month has been the norm since the time of erstwhile Shivraj Singh Chouhan government of the BJP.
People like Manmohan Singh and P Chidambaram, who as finance minister had fully supported the NPS, refuse to exercise their moral and political influence to try and stop Ashok Gehlot and others hell-bent on wrecking the states' finances, notes Virendra Kapoor.
By presenting the battle in Bengal as one between Mamata on one side and Modi-Shah on the other, the saffron camp has projected the former as a larger-than-life figure, a portrayal which has the potential of turning her into Modi's main competitor in 2024, predicts Amulya Ganguli.
'Rahul Gandhi has personally paid a heavy price for this character assassination and remorseless ridiculing and the Congress, of course, has been demolished politically.'
Noting that the Trinamool Congress which boasts of the slogan 'Maa Mati Mansuh' (Mother, Land and people) actually indulges in extortion, corruption and appeasement, Shah exuded confidence of forming the next government in the state and take it to the path of development.
'Mamata is synonymous with Bengal, its culture, language, traditions.'
Achik National Volunteer Council chairman Dilash R Marak's younger brother Sengman Marak is the Congress candidate from Rongjeng constituency at East Garo Hills district in Meghalaya. The ANVC, a banned outfit, is considered the most influential militant group in the Garo hills region of Meghalaya. The insurgent group, formed in December 1995, signed a ceasefire agreement with the Centre in 2004.
Shah also rejected West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's charge that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to a temple of the Matua community -- which is in sizeable number in the state -- during his trip to Bangladesh violated the poll code.
The West Bengal chief minister said no refugee living in the state will be deprived of citizenship. "You have an address, ration card, voter card, driving licence. There is no need to get this new card of the Bharatiya Janata Party. Don't worry, you will always find this didi beside you. Your family is my family. I will not let anybody take away the rights of our people," she asserted.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday tore into the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, blaming its "appeasement politics" for the failure of law enforcement agencies to rein in terror activities when it was in power and claiming it raised the "bogey of Hindu terror" to "misdirect" investigation.
The BJP urged the EC to take 'suo motu cognisance' and take suitable action.
Never before in the history of the Republic has an election in the state mattered so much as it does now, observes Virendra Kapoor.
The BJP says an 'assassin' is very different from a terrorist.
Highly critical of Karnataka government's decision to celebrate Tipu Jayanti to "appease" minorities, an article in 'Panchjanya' described him as 'Aurangzeb' of South who "forcibly" converted lakhs of people.
As leaders go, while Modi's visits to the state will be watched with curiosity, Rahul will need to be dislodged from the popular consciousness -- Tamil Nadu is one state where he's present, notes Aditi Phadnis.
The party believes that Mamata's poor handling of the pandemic and the devastation brought on by Cyclone Amphan will provide it the political fillip it needs.
The module was also planning to carry out targeted killings in India and was in the advanced stage of procuring arms, including automatic rifles and pistols, ammunition and explosives to carry out the attacks, he said.
'This is India, bhai. This kind of country does not exist anywhere in the world.'
Addressing a party rally in Mysuru, Shah accused the Congress of behaving like as it did during the Emergency.
Whatever the outcome from the assembly elections, what's evident is that West Bengal has entered an era of identity politics, reports Ishita Ayan Dutt.
They said it was then prime minister Rajiv Gandhi who on February 1, 1986 got the permission for starting prayers at the disputed site and got the locks opened.
Meanwhile, a group of college students, donning degree robes and selling 'pakodas' to passers-by in a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's remarks over job creation, were on today whisked away by the police, hours before the PM's rally in Bengaluru.
"This is part of our policy to empower minorities with dignity and without appeasement," Naqvi said.
The desecration of Vidyasagar's statue during Amit Anilchandra Shah's rally, which the TMC projected to be a 'Bhojpuri' and 'Dhokla' invasion on West Bengal's culture, may help her gain some favour with middle-class and erudite Bengalis in the last phase of the polls.
'But for Rajiv's bloopers, the Hindutva campaign would not have got off the ground,' Amulya Ganguli points out.
The prime minister also launched a blistering attack on Banerjee, saying she did not care to express regret after a "leader very close to her" called Scheduled Castes "beggars".
The term, 'pro-Pakistani', is helpful for the BJP to depict its opponents as anti-nationals while the sedition law is handy for locking up or harassing the government's critics, points out Amulya Ganguli.
With two years to go before West Bengal elects its next government, the BJP's internal objective is to scale down the Trinamool Congress tally from 211 to 45 seats. This amounts to an annihilation of the TMC while enabling the BJP to win a record 250 seats in the 295-member legislature, reports Radhika Ramaseshan
'When it comes to national politics, the Modi-Shah BJP has successfully redefined secularism.' 'If a party like the Congress has to have a future, it has to move closer to the secular centre from the far Left where its Left infatuation during the UPA years dragged it,' argues Shekhar Gupta.
Even as back channel talks over power sharing were on between BJP and Shiv Sena, the latter, in an apparent attempt to mend ties with its former ally ahead of government formation in Maharashtra, praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for hosting a Diwali tea party for National Democratic Alliance allies.
In the wake of claims by former Home Secretary R K Singh, BJP on Tuesday said Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde should be sacked if it is proved in an inquiry that he tried to prevent Delhi Police from taking action against an associate of underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.
Antulay's ministry is also the nodal ministry for the National Commission for Minorities, which conducted a string of inquiries, mainly into complaints of religious rights violations in non-Congress states, in 2006.
The term of the 224-member Karnataka assembly ends on May 28 this year.
The RSS has accused Congress-led UPA of dilly-dallying over the hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru to appease the minority community.
Jayanta Roy Chowdhury reports on how the West Bengal elections are being fought by the BJP and Trinalool Congress amid COVID challenges, 'Bangaliana', and campaigns based on religion, region, and caste.
The Bharatiya Janata Party is all set to take up the Amarnath land issue, the Centre's 'soft' handling of terror and the 'appeasement policy' of the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government in Saturday's youth rally in New Delhi, which will be addressed by party leader L K Advani.Announcing the youth rally at Ramlila Grounds in New Delhi, Thaker said, "The people of the country are agitated over the working of the government."
'Why are you not saying that the person who killed CRPF jawans was sent to Pakistan by BJP?'
