Counting of votes for the Lok Sabha elections has begun across states and Union Territories, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar told PTI.
Uttam Ghosh offers his take on this Theatre of the Bizarre.
A day after stating that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had a fall at her Kalighat residence 'due to some push from behind' leading to injuries on forehead and nose, state-run SSKM Hospital director Manimoy Bandyopadhyay on Friday clarified that all he meant was that the CM may have felt 'a sensation of push'.
The welfare schemes of the government, particularly Lakshmir Bhandar, have had a major impact on the electoral outcome.
Clashes broke out between two groups during a Ram Navami procession in West Bengal's Hooghly district on Sunday evening, police said.
Communal violence took place in West Bengal and Bihar during Ram Navami
Leader of the Opposition in West Bengal assembly, Suvendu Adhikari of the Bharatiya Janata Party, on Monday claimed that he was not invited to President Droupadi Murmu's civic reception on Monday evening.
Struggling to gain political traction on issues of corruption, the West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party is shifting its focus to emotive topics such as the Ram Temple in Ayodhya and the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in a bid to achieve its target of securing 35 out of the 42 Lok Sabha seats from the state.
With an eye on 2024 general elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party has identified 73,000 polling booths where it is weak and has constituted a committee to strengthen the party's position on them.
The party fielded Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur, while Uttar Pradesh minister Jitin Prasada has replaced Varun Gandhi in Pilibhit.
Two Ram Navami processions were organised in the Rishra police station area, and the second one came under attack near Wellington Jute Mill More on GT Road around 6.15 pm on Sunday, police said.
Saha, an MLA from the Burwan constituency, was being questioned by the CBI since April 14 in connection with the case as searches went on at his house in connection with the illegal recruitments in state sponsored and aided schools, they said.
Refusing to attach much importance to the series of defections plaguing the saffron camp in the last few months, Majumdar said those committed to the ideology and cause can never leave the party.
West Bengal and Assam voted in the first phase of assembly elections on Saturday. Polling was held for 30 seats in West Bengal and 47 seats in Assam amid tight security. Among the long queues of voters, there were some famous faces too who exercised their franchise.
The BJP has dropped C T Ravi, a leader from Karnataka, Dilip Saikia, a Lok Sabha MP from Assam, as its general secretaries, and Vinod Sonkar, Harish Dwivedi, both Lok Sabha MPs from Uttar Pradesh, and Sunil Deodhar as secretaries.
In controversial remarks, West Bengal BJP president Dilip Ghosh said that anyone who raises pro-Pakistan slogans would be beheaded.
An officer on Friday said that the police registered suo motu first information reports also against state BJP president Dilip Ghosh, national secretary Arvind Mennon and MPs Arjun Singh and Locket Chatterjee. They were charged with unlawful assembly, rioting, destruction of public property, criminal obstruction and assault on government servant and breaching the disaster management act, he said.
A voter turnout of over 40 per cent was recorded till 1 pm on Monday in the fourth phase of Lok Sabha elections in 96 constituencies spread over 10 states and Union Territories amid incidents of violence in Andhra Pradesh and reports of poll boycott in some villages of Uttar Pradesh.
TMC MP Abhishek Banerjee had addressed a public meeting in Kolkata on March 29.
West Bengal BJP chief claimed that there are two crore "Muslim infiltrators" in the country.
Earlier in the day, one person was killed and three were injured after a crude bomb went off in a mango orchard in Murshibabad district, police said.
Amid the ongoing debate over the Trinamool Congress seeking removal of Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta over his alleged meeting with West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party leader Suvendu Adhikari, TMC state general secretary Kunal Ghosh on Tuesday dropped unannounced at Mehta's residence, but was denied entry.
In the question paper, issued in an exercise book of a Bengali-medium school for Madhyamik aspirants, the paper setter has asked them to identify several places on the map (Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (referred to as 'Azad Kashmir' in Pakistan), the place where Gandhiji had first undertaken the Satyagraha movement, and the Chittagong battleground.
Bharatiya Janata Party's West Bengal unit president Dilip Ghosh said on Sunday that his party would "restore democracy" in the state if voted to power, warning Trinamool Congress cadres to mend their ways or they will have to either visit hospital or crematorium.
Rescue officials confirmed casualties in the incident, claiming to have already recovered 5 bodies from the heap of debris where the cracker manufacturing unit once stood.
Addressing a gathering in Basirhat, Khan said: "The intellectual persons who are being paid by the state government and are not supporting this (the Citizenship Amendment Act and National Register of Citizens) are the dogs of Trinamool."
In his four years as state party chief, Dilip Ghosh has put his foot in his mouth repeatedly. This hasn't stopped him from getting elected as a legislator in 2016 and as an MP last year.
Ghosh suffered minor injuries when a group of women allegedly attacked her when she tried to take one BJP agent inside a polling booth.
West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee and Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee are among the star campaigners of the party for the October 30 bypolls to four Assembly seats in the state, but interestingly, the names of actor-turned-MP Nusrat Jahan and former BJP leader Babul Supriyo, who recently joined the TMC camp do not feature in the list.
"If municipal elections can take place in Hyderabad and Assam, why not here. The situation is worse than Kashmir and is similar to that of Iran and Iraq. Didi (Mamata Banerjee) has proved that West Bengal's law and order is not conducive to go for polls," he said while addressing a party meeting in Kolkata.
Among the keenly watched contests are those involving former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav (Kannauj, UP) and Union ministers Giriraj Singh (Begusarai, Bihar), Nityanand Rai (Ujiarpur, Bihar) and Raosaheb Danve (Jalna, Maharashtra).
While the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress alleged that the killings were a fallout of the TMC's infighting, the ruling party pointed fingers at the grand old party of India.
Polling began at 7 am on Saturday for 44 seats in the fourth phase of the West Bengal assembly elections amid tight security, officials said.
'Every hospital now tracks length of stay closely.' 'More efficiency is brought into the system now.'
The notice cited Ghosh's alleged remarks that "if someone crosses his limits then you have seen what happened in Sitalkuchi. There will be Sitalkuchi in several places."
'Being a woman chief minister we certainly expect from her some decency that goes well with the culture and tradition of Bengal, and with the values of a Bengali woman'
The state government, however, has not sent any report as sought by the Union home ministry on "serious security lapses" during Nadda's two-day visit to West Bengal.
The event that was inaugurated by five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand will have 11 rounds before the best player in the under-20 category can be determined in both sections.
West Bengal Bharatiya Janata Party president Dilip Ghosh on Friday alleged that the Jadavpur University campus has become a hub of anti-nationals and communists and "our cadres" would conduct a Balakot-like surgical strike to destroy it.
Former Miss India Pooja Chopra talks about her Bollywood debut in Commando.
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