Events in America have strengthened the hand of those leaders there who wish India well, but think of India as being a collection of Indians.
If Indians are mistreated, they will object, asserts Aakar Patel.
Kamlesh Tiwari, 45, was earlier associated with a faction of the Hindu Mahasabha, they said.
Union minister Smriti Irani will also contest the Rajya Sabha polls from Gujarat from where she is already an MP and her term ends on August 18.
Sirisena's sacking of Wickremesinghe was the culmination of an year of bitter relations between them on several policy matters. The president has been critical of the prime minister and his policies, especially on economy and security.
In this COVID-19 phase, the BJP leveraged its pre-eminence again to tip the power scales in its favour and relegate its allies in the National Democratic Alliance to a lesser position. Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
'It may take the AIADMK much more convincing than already, not only to try and bring around even the one-time Muslim voters of the party. 'More importantly, the party leadership may find it even more difficult to convince traditional party voters and cadres, who had admired Jaya's nonchalance to the party and leader ruling the Centre,' says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Pompeo, during a Congressional hearing on Thursday, told the members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee that 'the actions are entirely consistent with what they have been signalling to the world for decades you might even argue since 1989, but certainly since General Secretary Xi came to power'.
Opposition parties, though resigned to the fact that they lack the numbers to defeat or stall the bill in the two Houses, have decided upon different tactics that they would employ to highlight their reasons for opposing it.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday came under attack in Lok Sabha from the Opposition which accused the ruling party of fuelling communalism, resulting in uproar in the House during a debate on communal violence.
For Stalin and the DMK, the declaration was the essence of the commencement of seat-sharing talks with the Congress, and even more, the launch of their combined campaign for the LS polls. That meant the DMK had to send out a message also to the 'minorities' in the state, who had deserted the DMK and very badly at that in the critical, post-Jaya R K Nagar assembly bypolls last year, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Amid noisy scenes, Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad introduced the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill 2017 for discussion and passage, but pandemonium broke out in the Upper House with the opposition creating an uproar and the BJP countering it vociferously.
There is 'negligible' support from Indian youth for the Islamic State, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said on Tuesday giving credit to families from minority communities for discouraging their children from getting influenced by the terror group.
He urged the crowd attending a pro-CAA rally to give a missed call to the 8866288662, pledging their support to the legislation. Shah also sought to dispel 'rumours' of discord within the NDA in Bihar and said CM Nitish Kumar will be the alliance leader in the state.
Women came out in large numbers to vote on Wednesday despite terror attacks and repeated threats.
Many issues dog the Mahagathbandhan of the Congress, Jharkhand Vikas Morcha-Prajatantrik and the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, the most prominent of which is seat sharing.
A bipartisan Congressional resolution has been introduced in the House of Representatives calling on the US government to continue the policy of denying a visa to BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi on the grounds of religious freedom violations.
'Chief Minister Palaniswami is meeting Modi on December, 19, he may mention Tamil refugees when he talks to him.'
'There appears to be no end to the errors that our leaders are willing to commit and no risk they are unwilling to run,' notes Mihir S Sharma.
A Hindu youth, who allegedly posted the 'blasphemous' content on his Facebook account sparking the outrage, is among those arrested.
Digvijaya Singh is no longer in Rahul's close circle of advisers. His move to the Upper House was to ensure that the senior leader does not meddle in Madhya Pradesh politics in the run up to the crucial Lok Sabha polls. Anita Katyal reports
Recent attacks on religious places led to a verbal clash in Lok Sabha on Wednesday.
Avtar Singh Khalsa, a longtime leader of the Sikh community who had planned to run in the parliamentary elections set for October, was killed in the attack.
China's presence in the international dog house is just the kind of opportunity that his opponents must be waiting for, predicts Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Absolute non-violence is not only sinful, but immoral.' 'This doctrine of non-violence benumbed the revolutionary fervor, softened the limbs and hearts of the Hindus, and stiffened the bones of enemies.' A revealing excerpt from Vikram Sampath's Savarkar (Part 2): A Contested Legacy, 1924-1966.
As the House resumed its sitting an hour late, the Speaker made it clear, "The debate should start now. Everybody is watching us. Please don't make me a scapegoat. Let us reach our goal," stressing that the process should reach finality on Monday.
'It cannot go unpunished,' he said on Twitter.
The legislators moved out of the resort as it was already booked for the weekend, sources said.
"We have urged Indian authorities to respect human rights and restore full access to services, including internet and mobile networks," she said.
'If the BJP doesn't want to accept the will of the people, then we will show them what a majority means.'
Information and Broadcasting Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said all the commissions were functioning and the process of filling up the vacancies was on.
Addressing a rally in support of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act in Kanpur, Adityanath said, "These people do not have courage to participate in the protests themselves. They know if they indulge in vandalism, their property will be seized. Now what have they done? "They started making the women sit at roads. The children have been made to sit. It's such a big crime that the men are sleeping under the quilt and the women are made to sit at roads. It is shameful," he said.
The daughter of a tea-shop owner, Sudiksha Bhati died on Monday morning near Aurangabad when she was riding pillion on a motorcycle with her younger brother, a minor, they said. The two were en route to their maternal uncle's home in Bulandshahr's Khanpur area from their house at Deri Scanar village in Gautam Buddh Nagar's Dadri tehsil, the officials said.
A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde, hearing a petition filed by lawyer Vineet Dhanda seeking stern legal action against those disturbing peace and harmony in the country in the name of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, said, "The country is going through a critical time, the endeavour must be to bring peace and such petitions do not help."
The Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Janata Dal on Monday said they would oppose the Women's Reservation Bill in its present form at an all-party meeting convened by the government and stick to their demand for separate quotas for women from the minority community, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and other backward classes. the meeting has been convened by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is Leader of Lok Sabha, to find a way out of the impasse on the bill.
Police on Thursday registered a case of murder into the deaths of two teenage girls whose bodies were found in a field in Unnao even as a post-mortem revealed no injury marks.
While members of Samajwadi Party raised the issue of Kasganj violence, the newly-elected Aam Aadmi Party members protested against the sealing drive in Delhi.
'This is not a government that will be an ally to supremacist ideology or strongman politics anymore, here or anywhere else,' asserts Suleman Din.
'There is now a new paradigm and that is also somewhat begrudgingly recognised by China. They are not all that thrilled that we have come to all these agreements.'
By passing this bill, Congress is showing that the US will not turn a blind eye to the suffering of the oppressed, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said.
Besides criticising CM Arvind Kejriwal on scores of issues, Shah alleged the AAP government made only promises throughout its tenure and now in the last three months, public money was being spent on advertisements for its announcements.
