The decision was taken to foil the attempts made by Chief Minister Mayawati to further split the party.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, his deputy Eknath Shinde and other legislators of the ruling BJP and Shiv Sena visited the memorial of RSS founder K B Hedgewar in Nagpur. NCP legislators, including Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, skipped the visit.
Call it political opportunism or sagacity, his moves, in effect, have not allowed the Bharatiya Janata Party to appoint its own chief minister to date, despite enjoying a near hegemonic status nationally and the best performance in recently held assembly polls where the saffron party bagged 89 seats, followed by the Janata Dal-United with 85.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday asserted that the party's Kerala leaders 'stand as one' and were 'united' by the light of purpose ahead.
Congress leader and All India Congress Committee (AICC) in charge of Karnataka Randeep Surjewala said on Sunday that the Congress Legislative Party (CLP) has unanimously passed the resolution and the observers will seek the opinions of all MLAs and convey it to the party high command.
Amid escalating tensions with Iran, President Trump is urging nations dependent on Middle Eastern oil to deploy warships to the Strait of Hormuz to safeguard critical global energy supplies.
The Congress high command has called senior leader Kamal Nath to Delhi and he is likely to meet party chief Sonia Gandhi on Monday, sources said.
The Congress Legislature Party, which met at a private hotel in Bengaluru on Sunday evening, passed a unanimous resolution authorising the party chief to pick its leader.
'Even if it is defeated and the Speaker remains, the Opposition parties that have lost faith in his impartiality will continue to have that feeling.' 'If the Speaker reflects on this and tries to be more neutral, more impartial, more objective in his conduct -- then one can say the resolution had a salutary effect. That would be the best outcome.'
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said the party will hold a meeting with other opposition leaders in the morning and would stage a protest march from the Parliament House to Vijay Chowk.
State NCP chief Jayant Patil will have all the constitutional rights till the next legislature party leader is elected.
Two investigations were ordered after six patients died due to alleged negligence at the state-run Saheed Laxman Nayak Medical College and Hospital in Odisha's Koraput, officials said on Wednesday.
"No one is above party discipline. Dinesh Trivedi did not consult me or Mukul Roy (the party all India general secretary)," party insiders quoted Banerjee telling the Trinamool Congress legislature party meeting ahead of the budget session of the West Bengal legislative assembly.
With a series of Assembly elections scheduled in the next few months to be followed by the Lok Sabha polls, the Congress Working Committee met on Saturday to take stock of the political situation and discuss possible alliances to hammer out a winning strategy.More than 150 delegates, comprising party General Secretaries, Secretaries, CWC members, Pradesh Congress Committee Presidents, Congress Legislature Party along with union ministers deliberated on the political scenario.
All India Congress Committee president Mallikarjun Kharge, senior Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah attended the ceremony held at the L B Stadium in Hyderabad.
Gandhi drove to Kharge's residence and held a closed-door meeting with the Congress chief.
He chose what was best for India, not for himself. Few can deny that when god took Shastri away so soon, they did India an injustice, points out Harishchandra.
The principal of a college in Odisha was arrested after a student set herself ablaze following alleged sexual harassment. The incident has sparked protests and political tensions in the state.
Uttar Pradesh Congress Legislature Party leader Pradeep Mathur has shot off a letter to Congress president Sonia Gandhi seeking her intervention. Sharat Pradhan reports from Lucknow
Congress legislators will spend Thursday night inside the Karnataka legislative assembly and council, demanding the sacking of Rural Development and Panchayat Raj Minister K S Eshwarappa and also that he be booked for sedition for his statement about the national flag.
'People of the state who bless me will give a befitting replay to the Congress.'
The Congress on Saturday named 22 more candidates for the Rajasthan assembly polls and denied ticket to Public Health Engineering Department Minister Mahesh Joshi from his Hawa Mahal constituency in Jaipur.
A blame game has begun within the Congress, even as legislators of the newly formed Meghalaya Progressive Alliance (MPA) decided to stake their claims to form the government in Meghalaya. The Congress, which emerged as the single largest party, has fallen short by just six seats to cross the majority threshold in the 60-member Assembly.
Addressing a press conference at Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot's home in Jaipur, Rohit Bohra, Danish Abrar and Chetan Dudi called themselves "soldiers" of the party and said they will do whatever the top leadership tells them.
While the Congress top brass has declined an invitation to the January 22 consecration ceremony at the Ram temple in Ayodhya, the party's Uttar Pradesh unit stuck to its plan to offer prayers in the holy city on Makar Sankranti.
The speculation on whether Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and former party chief Sonia Gandhi will attend the Ram temple consecration ceremony continued with the party on Thursday saying that their decision would be conveyed at the 'right time'.
A new cabinet in the state will be in place in the next 48-72 hours.
Governor Biswabhusan Harichandan administered the oath of office to 61-year-old Netam at a function held at the Raj Bhawan in Raipur.
The authorisation will be sent to Kharge and the MLAs decided to go by the decision of the party's top leadership, said Shivakumar, one of the AICC observers appointed to coordinate the CLP meetings.
The Yatra comes a day after the Congress was left high and dry with former ally Nitish Kumar, the Bihar chief minister, making a return to the BJP-led NDA.
According to political observers, the AIMIM sees a catchment area in Bihar, where Muslims are more than 17 per cent of the total population but have never got a proportionate representation in the state legislature.
Opposition parties in India are demanding a discussion on the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and national security in the upcoming Winter Session of Parliament. They raised concerns about federalism, national security, and the purity of voter lists during an all-party meeting.
This comes a day after President Droupadi Murmu gave her assent to the Viksit Bharat Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) (VB-G RAM G) Bill, which replaces the MGNREGA and has a provision for 125 days of wage employment for rural workers.
Senior Congress leader and Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee resigned as chief of party's West Bengal unit on Sunday citing "heavy government responsibilities", and Congress Legislature Party leader Manas Ranjan Bhunia was appointed to the post by Sonia Gandhi.
The development is seen as a move by the high command to pause the leadership tussle between the two, and signals Siddaramaiah's continuation as the CM for time being, especially ahead of the legislature session from December 8.
Rajasthan minister and key Gehlot-loyalist Shanti Dhariwal on Monday launched a frontal attack on Congress's state in-charge Ajay Maken, alleging that he was talking to party MLAs in a partisan manner and canvassing for Sachin Pilot.
The Mahayuti alliance in Maharashtra, comprising the BJP, Shiv Sena, and NCP, will decide whether only the chief minister and deputy CMs will take the oath of office on December 5, or whether ministers will also be sworn in. The swearing-in ceremony is scheduled for the evening at Azad Maidan in south Mumbai, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi attending. While BJP sources have indicated that Devendra Fadnavis is the frontrunner for the chief minister's post, the BJP legislature party leader is yet to be appointed. NCP chief Ajit Pawar has stated that the chief minister will be from the BJP, with deputy CMs from the Shiv Sena and NCP. The Mahayuti alliance secured a landslide victory in the assembly elections, winning 230 seats out of 288. The government formation has been delayed due to disagreements on the chief minister's position.
Ajay Maken was unhappy with her handling of the power situation in New Delhi.
Protesting against the attack on a Congress Legislature Party team in West Bengal, party activists clashed with the police in Kolkata and other towns across the state, leaving one person dead and several injured. Five Congress workers were injured in fresh violence in Mangolkot where a CLP team, led by Manas Bhunia, was attacked on Wednesday allegedly by supporters of the ruling Left Front. During the clash, Zia-Ur-Rahman Mullick, 40, died of a heart attack.
