Tamil Nadu's politics returns to being bi-polar, and that's a good thing, says B Srikumar.
Most of the parties supported 'one nation one election', says defence minister Rajnath Singh.
The man who led this journey is 50-year-old Kalanithi Maran, chairman and managing director of the Sun Group.
Tamil Nadu's ruling AIADMK may choose to capitalise on the confusion within opposition ranks and hope to ride to power on Chief Minister Jayalalithaa's popularity, writes N Sathiya Moorthy.
DMK blamed the Centre and state government for 'not taking appropriate, timely steps' to ensure conduct of the event and announced a state-wide stir.
'What we see here is puppetry. The string is with the BJP.' 'All the puppets here are dancing to the direction the BJP pulls the strings.'
These parties also asked the Centre to present a revised comprehensive economic package that will be a 'true stimulus' and sought reversal of all unilateral policy decisions, especially pertaining to labour laws, as they put forth a 11-point demand charter before the government during a virtual meeting, called by the Congress to discuss the situation arising out of the pandemic as well as the lockdown.
Declaring that he has no ambition of becoming prime minister, Pawar is holding Rahul Gandhi's hand, reassuring Mayawati and reaching out to Mamata Banerjee, reports Aditi Phadnis.
It is not unlikely that ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP government comes up with more imaginative schemes aimed at constituency-building. The party under Modi's leadership has a more modern thinking in such matters unlike its rivals, which are still steeped only in ideology, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'In mocking him, Modi and Shah went horribly wrong.'
'It made Gandhi determined to fight to the finish, which now has the entire Sangh Parivar rattled,' says a Congress leader, privy to the repeated RSS outreach for a rapproachment.
Congress's K R Ramesh Kumar will be the speaker of Karnataka's Vidhana Soudha (assembly), while the deputy speaker will be appointed from the JD-S.
The meeting between the two leaders lasted about 20 minutes.
Dr Vasudevan Maitreyan, was virtually the face of the AIADMK in New Delhi since February 2002, finds himself ignored by the current leadership.
If Vijaykanth and his party stole the media thunder, which lingered in the viewers' mind even while watching Prime Minister Modi's thunderous campaign speech, the latter suffered also owing to visible 'disconnects', says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Medical seats for under-graduates and post-graduates remaining vacant in the NEET era, together with the Centre 'freezing' the number of medical colleges and seats in (Dravidian) Tamil Nadu and the launch of the PM's 'Vishwakarma Scheme' for the nation's craftsmen, are all seen as a bid to further reverse the state's progressive socio-economic agenda of and its achievements of the past hundred-plus years, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Rahul Gandhi said the meeting was very productive and everyone decided to stop the BJP from further assault of institutions and the Constitution.
The chief minister still has time to repair the damage but he will have to act all-round, both at the government and party levels, suggests N Sathiya Moorthy.
Vellore is one of the two seats that the DMK alliance won by the narrowest of margins in 2019. For the DMK's vote-score to be so low in a constituency with a substantial Muslim population has not missed the BJP strategists' eyes, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The delegation comprised DMK leaders R S Bharathi, T K S Elangovan and Tiruchi N Siva.
The political stability that Tamil Nadu saw under Chief Minister Jayalalithaa may be a thing of the past, as the new administration struggles to find its feel, says R Rajagopalan.
The Congress on Tuesday termed as rhetoric and hollow on specifics the prime minister's address to the nation, saying there was no mention of a financial package or concrete steps to revive the economy.
Chief Minister Stalin seems to have drawn a line between his personal beliefs and those of others in the family, beginning with wife Durga Stalin, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Let me stick my neck out and say that Tamil Nadu will keep alive its reputation for landslide election verdicts, with the DMK front winning at least 30 of the 40 Lok Sabha seats going to the polls in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry,' says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
The great Indian election is over and now the wait for the results is shrinking with every passing moment. Though exit polls hint at a cakewalk for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his National Democratic Alliance, there are some battles which will be keenly observed on the result day.
Party leaders, sources said, maintained that Congress cannot afford to have a new leader at the helm for rebuilding the organisation at this juncture and that the responsibility for the defeat is collective and not individual.
The DMK feels its genuine gestures have had no bearing on the governor's politico-administrative conduct, which is 'more political and politicised than administrative and Constitutional', observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The tough question before the DMK and its leader MK Stalin now is, what should their response be if sounded out for an alliance by the BJP for or after the next parliamentary polls, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The case of the two Shiv Sena factions for legitimacy and the party symbol, 'Bow and Arrow', is now before the Election Commission. Whichever way the EC findings go, the other can be expected to move the Supreme Court. They would need a final verdict before the parliamentary polls, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
The new Congress president is building a core team of youngsters while waiting for his mother's coterie to retire, reports R Rajagopalan.
There was high drama before the commencement of National Eligibility cum Entrance Test for medical and dental courses, at various centres across Chennai, Coimbatore, Madurai, Salem, Tiruchirapalli, Namakkal, Tirunelveli and Vellore when students were frisked and some were asked to cut off their sleeves, while a few female students were asked to remove their bras!
A photograph of Kumar snapped while scurrying across the bridge with the child two days ago, has gone viral on the social media with people showering praise on him.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
There is a sudden realisation in party circles that prolonged court cases could damage its standing, both among the cadres and voters, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
With assembly elections only two years away, in 2016, the DMK may not have the luxury of time on its side. If the slow pace of reforms that the party has indulged itself in, in the past decade and more is any indicator, the committed 25 percent vote-share would either be frittered away, or lost, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Likening the situation in the country to a "social emergency", Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday made it clear that the nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of Covid-19 cannot be lifted in one go on April 14, asserting that the priority of his government is to "save each and every life".
In a nearly 25-minute televised address to the nation, Modi said implementation of the lockdown will be strictly ensured in its second phase and detailed guidelines will be brought out on Wednesday to ensure that outbreak does not spread to new areas.
The Tamil chief minister suffered a heart attack on Sunday evening.
The Hindutva social media continues to present the DMK especially as anti-god, anti-Hindu and anti-Brahmin. The strategy did not work in the past, it has not worked in the present, and would not work in the future, as a massive vote-getter, asserts N Sathiya Moorthy.
Trinamool Congress described it as "Black Monday" and a dark day for the country's constitution, the idea of India, and the Rajya Sabha
Slogans of 'Rahul ji, we are with you' and 'Please do not resign' rang through the air.
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