Out of the 129 candidates contesting the Goa assembly elections, 30 candidates or 23 per cent declared criminal cases. Vicky Nanjappa reports.
'Switching loyalty from one party to another is completely unfair as it devalues my vote.'
Ahead of the 2022 assembly elections, Churchill Alemao 'merged' the NCP with the TMC. The 'merger' took place when Mamata Banerjee was in Mumbai talking to NCP supreme leader Sharad Pawar on how to forge Opposition unity!
Congress President Sonia Gandhi's public rally in Goa on Saturday will be her first ever since her surgery in August, a senior Congress leader said in Panaji on Friday.
Before the withdrawal of support, the ruling coalition had 23 members -- Congress (16), NCP (3), Save Goa Front (2) and Independents (2). United Goans Democratic Party's unattached legislator Atanasio Monserratte gives issue-based support to the government.
Headed by former prime minister HD Deve Gowda, the JD-S has long been a strong third player in the southern state where the Congress and the BJP have been the two main parties.
Conveying good wishes to people of the state and all political parties for the New Year, he however wished that the Congress comes to power.
The move could be attributed to the withdrawal of support to the state government by the Nationalist Congress Party and some independent legislators.
With two contenders for chief minister's post, the Congress is having difficulty to install its government despite having numbers on their sides.
Leader of the Congress in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury while making these points however, spoke out against any need for change in the top leadership of the party, stating that both Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi have been 'trying wholeheartedly'.
He said a tie-up between the two parties could have caused a 'damage' to the BJP-led NDA on the 23 seats.
"They tried to buy our MLAs in Delhi and now in Punjab but we exposed them (BJP)," Kejriwal said.
Reacting to TMC's jibe, West Bengal Congress president Adhir Chowdhury said "agents of BJP" should not advise the party how to fight against the saffron camp.
The mother of the girl and another woman Rosy Ferros have also been arrested for selling the victim to the St Cruz lawmaker for Rs 50 lakh.
Having already triggered a controversy by his remark against "young girls going to pubs in short dresses", Goa minister Sudin Dhavalikar on Tuesday waded into another, saying bikinis should be banned on state's beaches.
AAP national convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will visit Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh next month to launch his party's foray into these states that are slated to go to polls later this year.
Former Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh on Friday hit out at the Congress for blaming the anti-incumbency of his four-and-half-years tenure for the poor show in assembly polls, saying the party's leadership will never learn.
Even if the BJP gets 60, 70, or even 100 per cent of the votes in the seats where it scored more than 50 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, these will still add up to only 224 seats, argues Shekhar Gupta.
A crucial meeting of the Congress Legislature Party to choose Goa's next chief minister got underway in Panaji on Thursday.
Rajasthan Governor Margaret Alva will be sworn-in as Governor of Goa on Saturday after predecessor B V Wanchoo resigned last week. Chief Justice of Bombay High Court, Mohit Shantilal Shah will administer the oath of office to the Governor at Durbar hall of the Raj Bhavan at 6 pm on Saturday, according to a statement issued by the state government.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday said if the Congress comes to power in Karnataka, dynastic politics will be at an all-time high in the state and it will be 'afflicted with riots'.
Shinde, participating in a discussion on the no-confidence motion in the Lok Sabha, took a jibe at the opposition coalition Indian National Develomental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) describing it as a 'destructive alliance' and said the next elections will be fought on the issue of scams of the United Progressive Alliance and schemes of the National Democratic Alliance.
There are 202 candidates in the fray, including Chief Minister Pratapsingh Rane for the 40-member House, which will go to polls on June 2.
A day after being booted out by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh from the post of Goa unit chief, Subhash Velingkar asserts that the Bharatiya Janata Party will pay dearly for his ouster.
Goa Chief Minister Digambar Kamat on Tuesday resigned following the humiliating defeat of Congress in the assembly election.
'In Chhattisgarh, MP and Rajasthan, he is far more popular than the defeated chief ministers,' notes Karan Thapar.
The numbers game seems weighed against Pratapsinh Rane.
Goa Police on Thursday conducted searches at the residence of former Chief Minister Digambar Kamat and in other places in the state in connection with the Louis Berger bribery case.
The four-day old Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party government will face the floor test on July 4 during the special two-day session of the Legislative Assembly beginning on Mumbai Sunday.
Describing former Chief Minister Digambar Kamat as a "habitual offender involved in corrupt practices", the Goa crime branch has alleged before a court in Panaji that he "actively participated" in the conspiracy and was among the beneficiaries in Louis Berger bribery case.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday announced Prime Minister Narendra Modi will fight again from Varanasi in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections as it named 34 Union ministers in the first list of 195 candidates.
The Election Commission has declined permission for use of a government college ground near Panaji as the venue for a Congress rally to be addressed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Against the backdrop of allegations pertaining to illegal mining, Goa Chief Minister Digambar Kamat met Congress president Sonia Gandhi in Delhi. Though the Kamat government has been facing heat over alleged instances of illegal mining in the state, the change of leadership is not on the cards at least till the Justice M B Shah Commission probing illegal mining submits its report. Kamat said his meeting with Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday was a courtesy call.
Many of the Congress stalwarts including four from Churchill Alemao family and state party chief Subhas Shirodkar bit the dust as the Bharatiya Janata Party-Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party alliance on Tuesday managed to bag majority of seats in Goa assembly elections.
Goa's Rural Development Minister Fransisco Miccky Pacheco, whose conviction for assaulting a government servant was upheld by the Supreme Court, resigned from the cabinet on Friday saying he did not want to cause further embarrassment to the BJP-led government in the state.
Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee along with party leaders and workers sat on a dharna at the Rajghat in New Delhi on Mahatma Gandhi's birth anniversary on Monday demanding the release of funds for West Bengal by the Centre.
