Soon after the suspension of 33 opposition Lok Sabha MPs, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said all democratic norms have been thrown into the dustbin by this "autocratic" government and it has shown zero accountability towards Parliament.
Loss of power in Bihar has upset the Bharatiya Janata Party's calculations for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls but a section of its leaders also see a chance for the party to break the dominance of regional parties in the state, like it has in Uttar Pradesh.
Sanjeev Kumar alias Sanjeev 'Mukhiya', an alleged kingpin behind the NEET paper leak, was not only minting money but wanted to become an MP or MLA.
Those joining Prime Minister Narendra Modi's council of ministers for the first time include three former chief ministers -- Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Madhya Pradesh), Manohar Lal Khattar (Haryana) and H D Kumaraswamy (Karnataka).
'We want to strengthen hands of Modiji and sure that LJP (Ram Vilas) will contest polls as an ally of NDA.'
'Nitish Kumar's newly-formed alliance with BJP would unravel before the 2025 assembly polls in Bihar'
BJP leaders Manohar Lal Khattar, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Bandi Sanjay Kumar and Ravneet Singh Bittu may be among the new faces in the Union council of ministers which will be sworn on Sunday evening along with Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi.
The last rites will be performed by Sharad Yadav's son Shantanu Bundela, the late politician's nephew, Shailesh Yadav, informed.
Amid deepening fissures in Kumar's ties with the Rashtriya Janata Dal and the Congress, BJP leaders have indicated that they are open to tying up with him again.
Along with Modi, senior BJP leaders including Rajnath Singh, Amit Shah, Nitin Gadkari, Nirmala Sitharaman and S Jaishankar, all ministers in Modi 2.0 Cabinet, took oath as cabinet ministers at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. In all, 71 ministers were sworn-in along with Modi, taking the strength of the Union council to 72.
"This also shows that the ruling dispensation's exasperation (baukhlahat) and desperation (hataasha). But the people of the country are smart enough and they (the BJP) will be held to account (hisab kar diya jaaega) at the appropriate time", said the close aide of the Bihar CM, who had quit the NDA last year and has since become a strong votary of opposition unity.
Union minister Raosaheb Danve has caused a flutter by saying if the Bharatiya Janata Party needs victory in the Aurangabad Lok Sabha constituency in Maharashtra in 2024, then it must ensure that All India Majlis e Ittehadul Muslimeen leader and sitting MP Imtiaz Jaleel contests the election next year.
Voting for the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu were held on Wednesday.
Kumar also asserted that his efforts should reap benefits for the younger generation, "for people like (his deputy) Tejashwi Yadav".
Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra on Tuesday claimed that the meeting of the ethics committee of the Lok Sabha was postponed to keep a Congress member away from the proceedings and adopt the report by a majority, prompting a sharp retort from Bharatiya Janata Party MP Nishikant Dubey.
Sources in both the BJP and the Janata Dal-United suggested such a possibility but it remained unclear if Kumar, the unquestioned leader of his party, has finalised a deal with the BJP top brass.
There is a view that heavyweight portfolios like home, finance, defence and external affairs besides education and culture, two ministries with strong ideological hues, will be kept by the BJP, while its allies can get anywhere between five to eight cabinet berths.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has raised the number of "difficult" Lok Sabha seats it is eying to win in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls to 160 from 144, with a big chunk of additions coming from Bihar where it is set to contest most of the constituencies on its own following its split with the Janata Dal-United.
'When voting clause by clause on Waqf came up in the JPC, the TDP and JD-U supported the BJP on each and every clause.'
Chaudhary alleged that the BJP "hates Bihar" after having lost power in the state, which is "back in the centre-stage of national politics" since the opposition meeting hosted in Patna by Nitish Kumar.
Exigencies of electoral politics and individual ambitions often stoke family feuds and sibling rivalries.
Modi earned his spurs as a doughty leader of the Opposition in the assembly, a post he held till 2004 when he got elected to the Lok Sabha from Bhagalpur.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi was on Tuesday poised to form the government for a third consecutive term with the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance getting a majority in the Lok Sabha, notwithstanding crushing losses in three Hindi heartland states after a bitterly fought election that was projected as a referendum on his popularity.
'Laluji is like my father and I am like his son.'
Sources said the committee is also expected to underline its unhappiness at the conduct of some opposition members during its proceedings and make a mention of it in its recommendations to the House.
'The JD-U is my party and of thousands of leaders and workers.' 'It is certainly not Nitish Kumar's party.'
The JD-U has five members in the Rajya Sabha, including deputy chairman Harivansh whose fate now hangs in the balance as he may have to resign since his party has moved out of the ruling alliance.
Having emerged as a senior partner of the National Democratic Alliance in Bihar for the first time in nearly two decades, the Bharatiya Janata Party finally seems to have come out of the shadow of its allies in the state but new alliance arithmetic has dragged down their overall vote share since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
It is a double century with a difference for the cricketer turned politician, who is the lead campaigner for the Opposition Mahagathbandhan in the state.
"There are six MPs in our party. It was the desire of five MPs to save our party. So, I have not broken the party. I have saved it. Chirag Paswan is my nephew as well as the party's national president. I have no objection against him," Paras told the media. Paras has been elected as the new leader of the Parliamentary party, who is currently representing the Hajipur Lok Sabha seat in Bihar.
'The BJP will use Samrat Choudhary and Vijay Kumar Sinha to check Nitish Kumar.' 'They will not allow him to function freely as before.'
BJP sources said a meeting of the National Democratic Alliance is expected to take place soon to highlight its growing strength and to dispel the impression that the departure of some of its oldest allies such as the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena, Shiromani Akali Dal and the Janata Dal-United have the left the saffron party without a major partner.
The juggernaut of the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance, which triumphed in three of the four east and north-eastern states that went for assembly bypolls on Saturday, was halted yet again in West Bengal where Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress registered a six-on-six clean sweep.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's quest to strengthen its base in north India starts from Bihar, says Bharat Bhushan.
The Congress leadership is upset over Nath's remarks against many leaders of the INDIA bloc, including Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and Janata Dal-United supremo Nitish Kumar, over seat sharing.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United on Wednesday asserted that it was "not scared of ED and CBI" following its break-up with the Bharatiya Janata Party, which rules the Centre and is often accused by the opposition of misusing investigating agencies.
The meeting of opposition parties has been called by Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar to chalk out a joint strategy to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
JD-U leaders contend that R C P Singh may have misled the BJP leadership into believing that Nitish Kumar was ready for a smaller share in power at the Centre.
There was no immediate response from the Aam Aadmi Party over the matter.
In a post on Twitter on Wednesday, the 28-year-old also named the Janata Dal-United as a client during the 2010 Bihar elections and brought up some caste surveys carried out in Uttar Pradesh by SCL India -- the parent company of CA.
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