The Bharatiya Janata Party's bypoll win in four of the six seats it contested has invigorated the party ahead of assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
'With the Election Commission wisening up to the practice, which strikes at the very root of electoral democracy, the practitioners of cash for votes have been getting more and more ingenious,' points out Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Responding to a question, Abdullah said elections can be held whenever the government wants.
Justifying his arrest, the ED said Kejriwal had been arrested bona fide and not for any mala fide or extraneous reasons.
In a landmark judgment that delivered a big blow to the government, the Supreme Court on Thursday annulled the electoral bonds scheme, saying it violates the constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression as well as the right to information.
Speaking to reporters in Thane, Pawar accused the Narendra Modi government of failing to fulfil any of the promises made by it since 2014 including bringing 'acche din, connecting villages through the internet, and providing toilets, water, and power to every household'.
Counting of votes will be held on Sunday in assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Telangana in what is seen as a semi-final contest ahead of the general elections in less than six months.
Political parties earlier used to seek vote on the basis of caste and religion, said Kejriwal.
In a massive setback to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, the Delhi high court on Tuesday dismissed his petition challenging his arrest in a money laundering case stemming from the alleged excise scam, saying there was no contravention of legal provisions.
Kishore said the Congress and its supporters are bigger than any individual and Gandhi should not be stubborn that it must be him who will deliver for the party despite repeated failures.
Sisodia was arrested Sunday over alleged irregularities in the formulation and implementation of the Delhi Excise Policy 2021-22.
Electoral trust is a non-profit organisation formed in India for orderly receiving of contributions from corporate entities and individuals to political parties.
'Nehru remains central to the polemic between the Congress and the BJP, or stated ideologically, between secular and Hindu nationalism.' 'The reason is that Nehru represents what is optimally possible as a secular politics along with liberalism and democracy in a country like India.'
Earlier this week, the Shiv Sena-UBT approached the Supreme Court seeking a direction to the Assembly Speaker to hear the disqualification petitions expeditiously.
The Congress said the rally by the INDIA will send a "strong message" to the Lok Kalyan Marg, where the prime minister's residence is located, that the BJP-led government's "time is up".
The BJP declared a total income of Rs 1917.12 crore during 2021-22 and spent Rs 854.467 crore or 44.57 per cent of it.
Ajit Pawar-led group was the real Nationalist Congress Party when two factions emerged in the party in July 2023, Maharashtra assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar on Thursday held.
With this, the ruling BJP has so far declared candidates for 136 seats. Earlier, the BJP had announced 79 candidates, including two lists of 39 each, and another list of one nominee.
Whether she will pare the fiscal deficit target of 5.1 per cent of GDP, using the record dividend received from the RBI, or expand flagship government programmes will be keenly watched.
Arguing before the entire EC, Mahesh Jethmalani, the counsel for the Shinde faction, also said the 'surreptitious and unconstitutional' change to the Shiv Sena's constitution by Uddhav Thackeray in 2018 and the ideological shift in the party, which aligned with the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party to form the government in Maharashtra in 2019, led to a split in the outfit.
Uddhav Thackeray and his followers have the option to stop riding a tiger and commence work around a more meaningful and enduring political ideology. It is an option Eknath Shinde's side may not have, supported as they were by the BJP, to maintain continuity of the old Sena, argues Shyam G Menon.
Legislators of the ruling coalition partners in Jharkhand expressed solidarity with the Hemant Soren government on Wednesday and said the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha leader will continue as the chief minister.
Speaking to reporters in Mysuru, he said, he is not giving priority to such things and was concentrating on strengthening the party.
'Pakistan is a nuclear country.' 'With the kind of situation that is there in Pakistan today, America will help Pakistan stay afloat.'
Kejriwal asked whether the BJP-led central government was waiting for the Lok Sabha elections to make a move in this direction.
The Congress on Thursday secured a seat in the present Bengal assembly as its candidate Bayron Biswas won the Sagardighi bypoll, defeating the nearest rival of the Trinamool Congress by 22,980 votes.
'The margin of victory or loss would make both camps rethink their strategies for the 2024 assembly election in Maharashtra.'
India has slammed Pakistan for its decision to hold elections in Gilgit-Baltistan and said any action to alter the status of the militarily-occupied region has no legal basis.
The Delhi high court on Friday sought a response from the Centre, Election Commission of India, and 26 political parties on a petition seeking to restrain opposition parties from using the acronym INDIA for their alliance.
The Election Commission on Monday rejected the nomination papers of the Congress candidate for Visavadar for not providing original mandate in time, paving the way for a straight fight between former Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel and the Bharatiya Janata Party's candidate.
A total of 833 candidates from 61 political parties, including Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel of the Bharatiya Janata Party, are contesting the polls in these assembly segments spread across Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Gandhinagar and other districts.
He is only the agent that can bring them that change for they are quite aware that he has articulated no vision on how to set Pakistan back on the rails, notes Lieutenant General Gautam Moorthy (retd).
After the outbreak of coronavirus in India, Bihar will be the first state to have assembly polls.
With this kind of coinage, the Opposition seems to be readily conceding the point that Modi is taller than all of them put together. So they need something bigger than themselves, collectively or not, to capture the voter imagination when it is about taking on Modi and the BJP in 2024, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'Modigate is snowballing into a huge thing with the electorate. The BJP is in for huge punishment by the electorate.'
Key states of Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Telangana would go for polls this year, besides states from the North-East.
The State Bank of India (SBI) on Wednesday told the Supreme Court that a total of 22,217 electoral bonds were purchased by donors between April 1, 2019 and February 15 this year, out of which 22,030 were redeemed by political parties.
'Union Budgets are often used as political instruments and that was the intention of this government too.' 'But while the exercise has settled two fronts, it has left open several others and this has the potential to aggravate with time,' predicts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The sessions court in Mumbai on Friday sentenced Parvez Tak to death in the 2011 murder of his step-daughter and actor Laila Khan, her mother and four siblings.
The Indian Olympic Association on Monday dissolved the ad-hoc committee for wrestling, saying "there is no further need" for it to continue after revocation of the suspension on the national federation, which now gets complete administrative control of the sport.
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