Tamil Nadu and Kerala are voting in single-phase for 234 and 140 assembly constituencies respectively.
Having kept it alive for four years with outside support, the Left on Tuesday branded the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government as 'no different' from its predecessor National Democratic Alliance government, on the economic and foreign policy fronts.The Marxist leader said Left parties, at their joint meeting in New Delhi on May 23, will further review the performance of the UPA government and take appropriate position.
The 'aura of invincibility' around Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been 'shattered' by the Indian voters who gave the Opposition a new lease on life, this is how the international media described the outcome of India's general elections.
It said the Congress will infuse new blood in leadership roles without creating new fault lines and cementing its ideological moorings.
Kerala Chief Minister and veteran Marxist leader Pinarayi Vijayan intensified his attack on the Congress, alleging that its general secretary, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, is contesting the Wayanad Lok Sabha by-election with the backing of Jamaat-e-Islami.
A national opinion poll conducted by a television channel has predicted 215 to 235 seats for the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance and 165 to 185 seats for the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance in the Lok Sabha polls. The poll, conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies for CNN-IBN, has predicted that the UPA alliance will have a vote share of 36.6 per cent while the NDA combine will cobble up 29.4 per cent votes.
Hoping to make its mark in Kerala, the BJP sewed up an alliance with the BDJS, the new party formed by SNDP, a powerful organisation of the backward Ezhava community.
Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Congress Vice President Rahul will represent the party at the swearing-in ceremony of Narendra Modi as the prime minister on Monday.
The National Democratic Alliance government made all efforts to bring the alleged Bofors scam guilty to the book, but the successive Congress-led governments tried to "kill" the case, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley tells Karan Thapar on CNN-IBN's Devil's Advocate show.
The BJP leader was referred to as 'Smt Sushma Gandhi' in an NDA press release.
Political pundits unanimously suggest that the state is not experiencing a discernible Gandhi wave this time around.
The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance lost power to the Congress-led alliance in the election despite its high-profile 'India Shining' media campaign.
Amid reports that Telugu Desam Party is cosying up to National Democratic Alliance, party chief N Chandrababu Naidu on Wednesday shared the stage with Bharatiya Janata Party's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi at a programme in New Delhi and heaped praise on the erstwhile Atal Bihari Vajpayee government.
The grand old party alleged that these namesake candidates are backed by the Communist Party of India-Marxist and the Bharatiya Janata Party to confuse voters.
There wasn't a common purpose and determination in the opposition, NDA convener Fernandes said.
The party alleges that the Railway Recruitment Board prefers north Indians over Maharashtrians.
The Left and the opposition parties have asked the government to abstain from the vote on March 6.
The Congress-led government was caught napping over the Left Front's opposition to the India-United States nuclear agreement, feels B J Panda, a member of the Rajya Sabha.
The TMC also announced it would hold talks with other regional parties in their bid to take on the BJP in the crucial 2024 elections but at the same time denied that it was planning a third front, separate from the Congress-led front.
Releasing the manifesto titled 'Badlav Ka Sankalp' (commitment to change) in the presence of All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Randeep Singh Surjewala and other Mahagathbandhan leaders, Tejashwi Yadav said their government, if elected, would first approve the process for appointments on about 10 lakh jobs in the government.
BJP IT department head Amit Malviya shared on Twitter what he said were the details of accidents under these ministers and added such 'worthies' are the ones demanding the resignation of the 'most qualified' railway minister the country has had in seven and half decades.
The political row had erupted after the National Democratic Alliance government inked the Rs 59,000-crore deal on September 23, 2016 to procure 36 Rafale jets from French aerospace major Dassault Aviation after a nearly seven-year exercise to procure 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft for the Indian Air Force did not fructify during the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance regime.
In a frontal attack on the Common Minimum Programme of the new Congress-led coalition government, the National Democratic Alliance
Oppn to take on govt in Parliament session
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday announced the formation of a seven-party rainbow alliance for the April 24 Lok Sabha polls in Tamil Nadu, in its first-ever such electoral venture in the state where the turf has been largely dominated by Dravida Munetra Kazhagam and All India Anna Dravida Munetra Kazhagam.
'Now Lalu is supporting the Emergency! Or so it seems. Chalo bhai, ab yeh din bhi dekhna tha.'
Former chief minister of Puducherry V Narayanasamy on Wednesday cautioned the voters against supporting the alliance comprising the Bharatiya Janata Party, AINRC and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in the coming assembly polls as these parties would have no qualms to merge the Union territory with Tamil Nadu.
Much drama is likely to continue in the coming year, within the Sangh Parivar as well as involving the Opposition parties and, of course the BJP's allies, predicts Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
While the major fronts, the CPI-M led LDF and Congress-led UDF have given three and one seat respectively to women, the BJP-led NDA has set aside five seats for their female politicians in the upcoming LS polls.
24 hours before campaigning ends in Thiruvanathapuram, Archana Masih/Rediff.com discovers Shashi Tharoor and his BJP rival Rajeev Chandrasekhar are busy getting their message across to voters.
What are the political equations, the challenges, and the threats?
Campaigning for May 13 elections in 96 Lok Sabha constituencies across 10 states and Union territories including all seats in Andhra Pradesh, where assembly elections are also being held concurrently, and Telangana concluded on Saturday evening.
While the opposition alliance is putting up a united front in Ghosi constituency in Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand's Dumri, Dhanpur and Boxanagar in Tripura and Uttarakhand's Bageshwar, its constituents are contesting against each other in Dhupguri in West Bengal and Puthuppally in Kerala.
The Trinamool Congress registered a decisive victory in West Bengal on Sunday, contrary to results of most exit polls which predicted a tight race between the BJP and the TMC with an edge to the Mamata Banerjee-led party.
Will Andhra Pradesh follow the Odisha model, voting differently in Lok Sabha and assembly elections? Or will Odisha follow Andhra Pradesh, voting in new faces in both?
N R Narayana Murthy, co-founder of Information Technology giant Infosys, has lamented that economic activities in India were 'stalled' and decisions were not taken by the Manmohan Singh government in time in the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance-era.
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