'Feeling claustrophobic and humiliated by the manner in which the Congress vice-president was treating him, he started toying with the idea of floating his own party.'
On the eve of the final phase of the Uttar Pradesh elections, Rediff.com's Aslam Hunani reviews the political landscape in the epicentre and beyond.
According to the Election Commission's website at 5.45 pm on Tuesday, the NOTA votes ranged as high as 2.1 per cent in Chhattisgarh to 0.5 per cent in Mizoram.
If the Congress manages to upset its dominant rival, the BJP, in these assembly polls, then it will be a big boost to the opposition for the Lok Sabha polls, while a good show by the BJP will energise its cadres and give a fillip to its hopes of retaining the power at the Centre in 2019.
The reverses for the BJP in the Hindi heartland threw wide open the 2019 Lok Sabha elections which until a few months ago appeared to be in the grip of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party.
'Star campaigner' to address election meetings in poll-bound Chhattisgarh, MP, Rajasthan.
As the five states -- Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Mizoram -- go to the polls, here is how the big names are faring.
Elections 2024 is not as open and shut as has been presumed. There is some life left in it, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The chief minister visited several villages in Khairagarh tehsil, the worst affected in the dust storm that left a trail of death and destruction, disrupting power lines, uprooting trees and claiming the lives of over 40 people in Agra alone.
Five states will go to the polls including Florida, Illinois, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio as well as the Northern Mariana Islands.
'Vajpayeeji's BJP was democratic.' 'It was a BJP that belonged to its party workers. Every worker, every member was an Atal Bihari.' Today's BJP belongs to businessmen.' 'Modi and Amit Shah have reduced the BJP to a two-man party.'
Here are 8 factors to watch out for, says psephologist Yogendra Yadav.
Singhdeo was the main architect of the Congress party's poll manifesto, which he said was made after feedback from about 80,000 people from across the state.
The party's gamble to go in for early elections paid rich dividends.
The counting for all five states will be held on March 11.
He said the poll victory in Assam, the first for the party in the north east, has made it clear that BJP is rapidly receiving "popular acceptance" in all parts of the country which "augurs well" for the democracy.
More than 5.79 crore voters will seal the fate of 3,740 aspirants including arch rivals Chief Minister Jayalalithaa and Dravida Munnetra Kazagham president M Karunanidhi, as the stage is set for polling in 233 assembly seats in Tamil Nadu under tight vigil on Monday.
In March 2012, UP made Akhilesh Yadav the state's youngest CM. In March 2017, he finds himself in the opposition. At this turning point, we look back at the Samajwadi Party leader's political trajectory.
'His success confirms that the infirm 132-year-old party can still get to its feet if it allows regional leaders to come to the fore,' argues Amulya Ganguli.
The unity by the opposition parties is likely to reflect inside Parliament as well.
Even before the trends started coming, eager party workers were seen glued to their smart phones viewing the counting progress online.
A total of 1,203 candidates, including 109 women, are contesting for the 140 assembly seats in which a total of 2.61 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise.
Priyanka is one of the star campaigners of Congress for the upcoming Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections and has also played an important role in forging an alliance between Congress and the Samajwadi Party.
The two parties, however, are in a neck-and-neck race in Manipur and Goa.
The BJP wants to win a state where it has been out of power for 15 years. The Congress wants to make its mark in a state where it has been a bit player for nearly 30 years. And the BSP wants to recapture power it lost 5 years ago.
In Mizoram, opposition MNF likely to end 10-year Congress rule.
Apart from Kerala, the northeast perhaps is the only region where Congress can expect a decent win in the recently held Lok Sabha elections. K G Suresh looks at what the elections hold for the northeast.
He recalled that democracy-lovers had fought a big battle against the Emergency.
Journalist-turned-activist Teesta Setalvad in her new book 'Foot Soldier of the Constitution: A Memoir' has spoken of the rise of communalism and the aftermath of the '02 Godhra riots. In this interview with Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf, she discusses her book, the cases against her and the state of secularism in the country.
Now that an elected chief minister is at the helm, it is high time the Centre initiate discussions to appoint a full-time governor at the earliest, given that the state is set to face some challenging times, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Trinamool government, which cashed in on the Nandigram protests in West Bengal politics, has not yet given the Central Bureau of Investigation the sanction to prosecute five police officers involved in the 2007 police firing which killed 14 villagers.
'The creation of Pakistan was integral to Britain's grand strategy.' 'If they were to ever leave India, Britain's military planners had made it clear that they needed to retain a foothold in the NWFP and Baluchistan because that would provide the means to retain control of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar.'
Read the full transcript of President Obama's State of the Union address on Wednesday at the US Capitol in Washington.
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