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 more capable State -- one that operates with greater capacity, greater efficiency, and greater clarity of purpose.' 'But I also see a more despotic State -- one that places more constraints on speech, assembly, dissent, and critique.' 'It may run 'better', but on the regime's rules.'
The alliance would announce a coordination committee, which could be of 11 members from principal opposition parties.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi along with some opposition leaders too expressed surprise over the President not being invited to the important occasion of shifting Parliament to new premises.
Counting began at 8 am under multi-tier security cover. At first, postal ballots will be counted and then EVMs opened.
Despite heavy snowfall in Srinagar, the rally to mark the culmination of Bharat Jodo Yatra went ahead, with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other prominent leaders of opposition parties addressing the march.
According to the sources, the meeting will be held at 10 am on Thursday in the chamber of Rajya Sabha LoP.
Sources said the opposition parties would look to avoid the prickly leadership question as of now and emphasise on building a common ground.
Indications are that the DMK combine will win more seats than the AIADMK and BJP, but is facing a tough fight in about half a dozen from the rest, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy of the electoral contest in Tamil Nadu.
Sources said that despite senior leaders making serious attempts to convince him to rethink on his decision, Gandhi is said to be unfazed.
While the BJP and the Congress have always supported the bill, opposition by other parties and demands from some for quota for backward classes within the women's quota have been key sticking points.
Sources said the Congress Parliamentary Party authorised Gandhi to pick the party's leader in Lok Sabha.
Rajasthan is reeling under a huge financial burden with the state's debt having gone beyond Rs 5.59 lakh crores. Rajasthan has increased expenditure on education by 203.4 percent, by 105.4 percent on health, by 227.14 percent on housing. Its expenditure on social welfare schemes has increased by almost 2,475 per cent.
'What the Congress needs now is an ideological and social contrast to the BJP.' 'The Congress stable of princelings cannot do it,' argues Mohan Guruswamy.
Per capita income in the state has consistently been below the national average for at least 24 years. However, it has narrowed the gap with the all-India level in recent years.
The bus careened and went down to a field behind the highway, leaving a few passengers slightly injured. Its occupants were brought back to Purulia town in West Bengal for medical treatment, a party leader said.
Veteran Congress leader Digvijaya Singh and Bharatiya Janata Party candidates Jyotiraditya Scindia and Sumer Singh Solanki on Friday won Rajya Sabha election from Madhya Pradesh.
The Congress chief reiterated that Rs 30,000 crore was "wrongfully" given to Anil Ambani in the purchase of Rafale fighter planes.
What some of our leaders were up to on Tuesday, November 15.
Several legislators in states on Monday said they have cross-voted in favour of National Democratic Alliance nominee Droupadi Murmu by not following their respective party lines in the presidential election.
Senior leaders P Chidambaram and Digvijaya Singh are learnt to be the front-runners to take on the mantle of Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha.
Top leaders of Opposition parties will brainstorm at a meeting in Patna on Friday to chalk out a roadmap for the formation of an anti-Bharatiya Janata Party front for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, with sources saying that they would look to avoid the prickly leadership question and emphasise on common ground.
The EC is believed to have told the Governor that Soren should be 'disqualified' as a legislator for violating electoral norms, they said.
The Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray on Friday made a pitch for unity among opposition parties ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, stating that the Bharatiya Janata Party can be defeated if all key leaders of these political outfits keep aside their ego and stick to their current stance of not keen on becoming the next prime minister.
In a memorandum submitted to Manipur Governor Anusuiya Uikey, the 21 opposition MPs who signed the document demanded urgent rehabilitation and resettlement of the affected people to bring peace and harmony to the state.
Raking up the border issue, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday said every individual in Ladakh knows that China has "taken away our land" and claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's assertion that not an inch of land was taken away was "absolutely false".
A delegation of 21 Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc MPs will pay a two-day visit to Manipur beginning Saturday to assess the ground situation first-hand and then make recommendations to the government and Parliament for a solution to the problems in the violence-hit state.
A sizeable number of MLAs from across state assemblies cross-voted in support of President-elect Droupadi Murmu, defying their parties' stated support to Opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha, sources said on Thursday.
Opposition members of the Lok Sabha ethics committee on Thursday stormed out of a meeting along with Mahua Moitra, accusing the panel's chairperson of asking the Trinamool Congress MP personal and unethical questions.
The original suggestion was to call it 'Indian National Democratic Inclusive Alliance', but the word 'democratic' was replaced with 'developmental' after Kumar and Yechury raised some objections saying it sounded too similar to the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA), sources said.
With the ignominy of a duck in Delhi, the free-fall in Congress' fortunes under Rahul Gandhi continued unabated with possibly grim forebodings for the grand old party.
The arrest, the first of a sitting chief minister, came hours after the Delhi high court refused to grant protection to the AAP national convenor from any coercive action by the agency.
Senior Congress leader B K Hariprasad's statements regarding ministerial and chief ministerial posts, along with his veiled dig at Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah seems to have created a sense of unease within the ruling party in Karnataka.
What some of our leaders were up to on Friday, November 11.
'If the leadership goes back to Rahul Gandhi, then there will be a perception problem about the drama about his exit a year-and-a-half ago.'
The complaint has been filed by Vineet Jindal, a Supreme Court advocate.
Efforts to forge unity in the opposition ranks gained momentum on Monday with the Congress asserting that a 'vast majority' of non-Bharatiya Janata Party outfits will meet soon, after Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar met its president Mallikarjun Kharge and senior leader Rahul Gandhi.
Kerala Chief Minister and CPI-M leader Pinarayi Vijayan, Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu, West Bengal CM and Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee, and Karnataka CM Kumaraswamy lent support to the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party government's fight with the Centre.
Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren's jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi over their telephonic talks on COVID situation triggered political slugfest with the Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday accusing Soren of lacking the basic courtesy expected of a person holding his office and lowering its dignity.
While it took the Congress nearly a half century to earn the hatred of other political outfits, the BJP appears set to reach there in around six years, says Arun Bhatnagar, former secretary to the GoI.
