It was good fortune for India to have Atal Bihari Vajpayee lead the government at a crucial moment in our history. He avoided India meeting the fate of Iraq or Ukraine, asserts military historian Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on Wednesday said a "new tradition" of levelling allegations and counter-allegations being observed in Parliament and state Assemblies these days is not proper for the country's constitutional democracy, and stressed the need for constructive debate and discussion in Houses to make democracy "lively and active".
He claimed that out of 90 secretaries of the government of India, only three are from the Other Backward Classes and control only five per cent of the Budget, which he said was an "insult" to the backward classes.
Questioning the Congress's stand on caste census, the BJP leader made certain remarks on Gandhi's caste that triggered the uproar and had Congress members trooping into the well of the Lok Sabha. "Anurag Thakur insulted me and I don't want any apology from him. Abuse or insult me as hard as you can but don't forget we will pass the caste census in this Parliament for sure," the Leader of the Opposition said.
"The open-ended nature of Section 6A has, with the passage time, become more prone to abuse due to the advent of forged documents to establish, inter-alia (among other things), wrong date of entry into Assam, inaccurate lineage, falsified government records created by corrupt officials, dishonest corroboration of the date of entry by other relatives so as to aid illegal immigrants who are otherwise not eligible under Section 6A by virtue of having entered into Assam after March 24,1971," he noted in a separate 127-page dissenting judgment.
The Congress on Friday hit out at the Election Commission after it rejected allegations over irregularities in the Haryana assembly polls, saying if the poll panel's goal is to 'strip itself of the last vestiges of neutrality', then it is doing a 'remarkable job' at creating that impression.
Modi wants the BJP to gets an additional 10% of the vote share from what it won in 2019. Plans are afoot to get new faces to replace MPs with poor chances of winning. Sources say more than 100 MPs are like to be axed, notes Modi biographer Ramesh Menon.
However, in 950 booths, voting will end at 4 pm, though people standing in the queue at that time will be able to exercise their franchise.
The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) has prepared a pool of more than 100 personnel to man additional security counters expected to be handed over to it for easing the ongoing congestion at large airports of Delhi and Mumbai, official sources said Wednesday.
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 plan to relieve NSG from VIP security tasks has been in the making since 2012 when NSG commanders foresaw an event where simultaneous terror attacks could be witnessed at one time on multiple centres in the country and the commandos will have to be rushed in different directions.
'Jairam Mahto's new party dented the NDA because he pulled a lot of the OBC vote.'
'Money power was deployed like an army in a war.' 'None of the MVA parties had that kind of money.'
Another Member of Parliament, Professor Manoj Jha from the Rashtriya Janata Dal, who also went for a function in which Rahul Gandhi was participating in London, had all due permission including -- the due political clearance.
Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Wednesday said the Preamble to the Constitution is very well there in NCERT textbooks of Class VI as he refuted charges made in this regard by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge.
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.
Asking the Congress members, who were on their feet, to maintain the decorum of the House and not show placards, Birla said they should let the House function.
'Rahul is a seasoned player of politics and chess. He makes his moves after careful consideration.
As the Queen star found herself in the middle of a row, with the BJP distancing itself and the Congress attacking it, here's a look at some of the controversies, political and otherwise.
The reservation would include a 10 per cent horizontal quota for Agniveers in the posts of constable, mining guard, forest guard, jail warden, and special police officers.
Sources in the government said the roof that collapsed at T1 was constructed during 2008-09 and that the work was contracted out by GMR to private contractors.
Gandhi's remarks come amid repeated attacks by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying that the Congress manifesto bears a 'Muslim League imprint'.
Their leaders go abroad and abuse India, while BJP workers sacrifice everything for the sake of the nation, Modi said.
Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu on Monday expunged the references made by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to Sonia Gandhi in the House on July 28.
There were some tense moments as BJP members, carrying placards, marched towards the opposition members near the Gandhi statue in Parliament premises to condemn their 'undemocratic actions' inside the House.
The first round has clearly gone to Rahul. Now all eyes on Prime Minister Modi's reply to the debate on motion of thanks, when one can be sure he will respond in his characteristic style.
Long queues were seen at outpatient department ticket counters in government hospitals, where senior doctors joined their junior colleagues in the protest.
'The work of a film-maker is going out and making films.' 'And if you are in prison for 15 years, you can't make films.'
'BJP and RSS may have differences over minor issues but their hearts long for one common aim -- that of A Hindu Rashtra.' 'And this time to prove this point the RSS has prepared to help BJP win this election with all its might.'
There is no use of the BJP targeting the likes of Mamata Banerjee and M K Stalin, directly by the party's political bosses, both in Delhi and the respective state capitals, or even using the Raj Bhavans to fire those salvos from. Successive elections have proved that it's counter-productive, if anything. But the BJP is yet to understand it, acknowledge it, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman's Budget speech on Wednesday was marked by the usual thumping of benches by the ruling alliance members, but the loudest cheer was reserved for her announcement of income tax relief, which was welcomed by 'Modi, Modi' chants in Lok Sabha that also witnessed a few instances of protest by the Opposition.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned twice in the post-lunch period on Thursday as a war of words broke out between the treasury and opposition benches, triggered by Congress MP Charanjit Singh Channi's spat with the Bharatiya Janata Party's Ravneet Singh Bittu.
"Give up arms and come for talks or our forces will hunt you down," the home minister said in election rallies in Jammu and Kashmir.
His fresh attack came a day after he said the government is coming up with 'excuses' to stop the Kanyakumari-to-Kashmir yatra, which is currently in Haryana and will enter the national capital on Saturday.
The Congress accused the BJP of spreading mischief through its "hate factory".
Under the relevant law, the activist may get a jail term of two years or fine or both as the punishment.
Along with the 'CryPM' QR code, the party also put out a 'PayCM' QR code poster too, with Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai's image in the middle.
The former Congress president also tagged a post by Tesla CEO Elon Musk in which he talked about eliminating EVMs.
In the event of the BJP's poor performance in the assembly polls this year and in early 2025, Modi's hold will get further weakened because he will no longer remain the invincible electoral persona tightly controlling the machine at his disposal, asserts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
With Atishi at the helm it will not be easy for the BJP to continue using the LG's office and the bureaucracy as political instruments to hinder governance and thereby provoke the electorate's ire against the AAP, expects Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
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