Over 95 lakh voters will decide the fate of 539 candidates, including 43 females, in 65 constituencies spread across the state.
Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi on Wednesday called upon the Central government to involve ULFA general secretary Anup Chetia in the on-going peace talks.
'BJP loses a democratic election, then buys MLAs from the ruling party's flock and rides to power in these states.' 'Do you think Atalji would have tolerated this?'
Chetia, who was in Bangladesh since his arrest by the neighbouring country's police in 1997, was handed over to India at the personal intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and through active involvement of National Security Advisor Ajit Doval.
Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat on Saturday said that China's ambitions and aspirations to global power presented an 'omnipresent danger' to stability in South Asia.
The Assam government has raised demand for coordinated action in Arunachal Pradesh,Nagaland, Manipur and Meghalaya if training, arms supply transit routes of and shelters of militants are to be choked.
Chetia had on Wednesday got bail in the last of the four cases against him paving the way for his release from the jail.
Security agencies are apprehensive that the Jalpaiguri blast is merely an indicator of the unrest triggered by fundamentalist outfit Jamaat-e-Islami along the India-Bangladesh border, says Vicky Nanjappa
The elections in two eastern Indian states were keenly observed in Bangladesh for two major contentious issues, writes Prakash Bhandari from Dhaka.
The Centre should focus on achieving peace either through long-term ceasefire agreements or sustained military operations. Military operations which are just intermittent responses to particular incidents won't lead anywhere, says Devanik Saha.
The competition for the worst or most perilous 10 years has always been between the 1960s and the 1980s, points out Shekhar Gupta.
Newly floated Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP), led by former All Assam Students' Union leader Lurinjyoti Gogoi, on Thursday forged an alliance with the Raijor Dal of jailed anti-citizenship law activist Akhil Gogoi for the upcoming assembly elections.
Naga splinter groups impatient with stalled talks as well as rebel Manipuri groups who have a stake in disrupting upcoming elections to the state assembly, are believed to be regrouping in the borderlands of China's Yunnan province and Myanmar, taking advantage of the turmoil in the latter by using it as a transit corridor.
81 per cent voter turnout recorded in West Bengal, 80 per cent in Assam.
One priority for Delhi (for the new foreign secretary in particular) is to have an in-depth discussion with Dharamsala as soon as possible, suggests Claude Arpi.
The Central Bureau of Investigation on Thursday placed Anup Chetia, founder member of banned United Liberation Front of Assam militant group, under arrest in connection with a nearly three-decade-old murder case registered by the central probe agency.
The counsel appearing for Assam told the bench that they would place certain 'confidential documents' in the matter before the court for its perusal.
'Everything was sacrosanct when the BJP was led by Vajpayee and Advani.' 'That was a different culture. But with Modi and Amit Shah nothing is sacrosanct.'
Sonowal said the judgement is a reflection of India's democratic values where human rights and fairness are respected.
AFSPA can be safely lifted from almost 90 per cent of Nagaland, argues Shekhar Gupta.
Nineteen political parties, including the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress, received over Rs 1,100 crore during assembly polls in five states and Union territories in 2021 and spent over Rs 500 crore, a big chunk of which went towards advertisements and travel expenses for star campaigners, a study said on Friday.
The Supreme Court found enough grounds to order a CBI probe into 1,528 extra-judicial killings in Manipur between 2000 and 2012.
Anup Chetia, who is now lodged at the Guwahati Central Jail, said that he wanted to join the pro-talks faction of the ULFA.
An influential Hindu organisation in the United States has slammed a group of lawmakers for introducing a resolution in the House of Representatives on record of India's religious freedom arguing that it is grossly inaccurate and aims to provoke.
Indian intelligence agencies have often claimed that left-wing extremists are trying to make inroads in the militancy-hit regions of north-east to foment further unrest. But Jaideep Saikia, noted terrorism and conflict analyst, claims, "People who speak of Maoism taking roots in the north-east have not read history".
Many laws on the books are contradictory, and it is a truism that no Indian citizen or business can comply with every single law.
Adequate security and Covid safety measures have been put in place for the electoral exercise.
By writing a scathing letter to Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio on the breakdown in law and order in the state, is Governor R N Ravi creating the ground for consolidating his power and directly influence proceedings in the state, asks Sandeep Pandey.
Critical of the hurried clearance of the food security ordinance, Bharatiya Janata Party President Rajnath Singh said on Thursday the United Progressive Alliance government was just doing a "political gimmick in a hurry" before the 2014 general elections.
The tripartite agreement was signed by Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, top leadership of the four factions of the NDFB, ABSU, Joint Secretary in the Home Ministry Satyendra Garg and Assam Chief Secretary Kumar Sanjay Krishna in presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
There will be 2,364 counting halls as compared to 1,002 halls in 2016 in 822 assemble constituencies, a more than 200 percent increase, in view of the COVID guidelines, according to the Election Commission which had drawn flak from the courts over the conduct of polls during the pandemic.
It is important to approach the belief of people in ancient India's achievements with a sense of proportion, balance and empathy, argues B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
Chetia was deported to India last week after being jailed in Bangladesh for 18 years.
Veteran doctor and educationist from Karnataka Belle Monappa Hegde and archaeology legend B B Lal were also given the Padma Vibhushan awards.
Manipur needs an integrated politico, military, socio-economic approach, says Sanjeev Nayyar.
Mamata Banerjee fended off a spirited challenge by a resurgent Bharatiya Janata Party in West Bengal with a landslide victory for her Trinamool Congress on Sunday for a third consecutive term and the saffron party and the Left Democratic Front were poised to form government again in Assam and Kerala respectively while the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam stormed back to power in Tamil Nadu after a gap of 10 years.
In an exclusive interview with rediff at his New Delhi residence this week, former Union Home Secretary G K Pillai categorically stated, "Smaller states have the advantage of effective administration as well as speedy development."
Exploiting the killings to ratchet up the tension in the region and harden negotiating positions with the central government serves nobody, least of all the people of Nagaland. The peace process must not be stalled because of this incident or distracted by calls to repeal the AFSPA, argues Vivek Gumaste.
Few people know Ratan Tata as well as R K Krishna Kumar does. Widely perceived to be among the managers closest to Tata, Krishna Kumar assesses Ratan Tata, the man and business leader, in this exclusive interview to Rediff.com's Vaihayasi Pande Daniel.
The Tibetan nation still lives under the yoke of the Chinese Communist Party, and Beijing today has a guilty conscience; this creates a great uneasiness for Xi Jinping and his colleagues observes Claude Arpi.
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