With the cabinet expansion being deferred repeatedly, several aspirants, especially those from Congress, had openly expressed their displeasure over the delay, piling pressure on the party to fill its quota so as to avoid any trouble ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
All senior leaders will be along with Rahul Gandhi during these programmes and this will be the 'first leg' of the campaign by the Congress president.
Nilekani has been maintaining silence on reports about his political plans, which has gained more currency after the KPCC reportedly shortlisted his name among the three probable candidates for Bangalore south recently.
In key organisational changes, the Congress on Wednesday appointed young face Anil Chaudhary as its Delhi unit chief and named D K Shivakumar, known to be the party's chief troubleshooter in crisis situations, as the head of the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee.
Expressing resentment at party MP Shashi Tharoor praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress' Kerala unit on Wednesday decided to submit a report to the party high command seeking suitable action in the matter.
Hitting out at Tharoor, Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee working president and the party's chief whip in the Lok Sabha, Kodikkunnil Suresh on Friday said everybody in the party should work according to it's policies and programmes.
Discord in the Congress in Kerala between Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and KPCC president Ramesh Chennithala has sharpened after the possibility of the latter's entry into the state cabinet with a plum portfolio got dimmed.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party needling it on the issue of naming chief ministerial candidate, Congress on Monday said it was its strategy not to declare its choice for the post in the run-up to the May five in Karnataka Assembly polls in which it hopes to come back to power.
In a blow to the Congress in poll bound Kerala, Senior leader P C Chacko on Wednesday announced his resignation from the party, alleging group interest in deciding party candidates for the assembly elections.
Days after facing party action for praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress MP Shashi Tharoor on Saturday led a cleanliness campaign at Vizhinjam near Thiruvananthapuram and said no political meaning should be read into it.
He said the states needed to also do their bit on reduction of petrol price.
The JD-S, which has 34 seats in the assembly, is not in a position to win a seat in Rajya Sabha on its own and will need support from the Congress with its surplus votes. A minimum of 44 votes are required for candidates to win. If he wins, this will be the second Rajya Sabha entry for 87-year-old Gowda, the first time being in 1996 as PM.
Haripad, the rural assembly segment in Kerala's rice bowl Kuttanad, has gained greater political significance with the entry of KPCC president Ramesh Chennithala as the United Democratic Front candidate.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh on Saturday dissociated itself from a controversial article published in its Malayalam mouthpiece that Nathuram Godse should have targeted Jawaharlal Nehru instead of Mahatma Gandhi as he was responsible for Partition, a view that came under attack from political parties.
The Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala has charged the Communist Party of India-Marxist Poliburo of supporting corruption in the party by aligning with the official faction of the party in the multicrore SNC Lavalin corruption case.
The LDF was also leading in 10 out of the 14 district panchayats and 108 block panchayats of the total of 152, according to the State Election Commission figures.
Former BJP union Minister Taradevi Siddartha, former Kannada Paksha MP S B Sidnal and former Janata Parivar Karnataka Assembly Legislator Jayaprakash Hegde on Tuesday joined the Congress in the presence of Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) President Mallikarjun Kharge. Speaking to newspersons, Kharge said Congress chief Sonia Gandhi has approved their induction into the party.
The new entrants will be welcomed into the party by All India Congress Committee general secretary Prithviraj Chavan in the KPCC office, party state general secretary M Ramachandrappa told PTI in Bangalore.
Interim president of the Congress party in Kerala M M Hassan has courted a controversy with his remarks that menstruation was impure and women should not enter temples during that period.
In a counter offensive after 13 MLAs resigned on Saturday dealing a blow to the 13-month-old government, a delegation of Congress leaders met Speaker K R Ramesh Kumar and submitted the petition seeking, under the anti-defection law, disqualification of the rebel legislators in line with the decision taken at a meeting of the Congress Legislature Party on Tuesday.
The Congress suggested there was cash stashed in the trunk.
The RSS leader said he had not violated any customs and claimed that he ascended the 18 steps carrying the sacred offerings.
The Lok Sabha constituencies that JD-S will contest are Uttara Kannada, Chikkamagaluru, Shivamogga, Tumkur, Hassan, Mandya, Bengaluru North and Vijayapura.
The Congress leadership has also asked its leaders not to make any public statements on sensitive issues.
Trouble began when a group of Congress workers protested the presence of former KPCC general secretaries -- Sarthchandra Prasad and Rajmohan Unnithan -- in the party office premises.
"If the Opposition gets into singing praises, then democracy will be destroyed," Sharma said.
The high command's choice of Thennala Balakrishna Pillai and Vayalar Ravi for the election to the Rajya Sabha appears to have prompted the resignation.
Congress leaders have hit out at the BJP governments at the Centre and in Karnataka, questioning its timing.
A case of attempt to murder was registered on Monday against Congress MLA J N Ganesh in connection with the alleged brawl with lawmaker colleague Anand Singh at a resort, police said.
The mortal remains of a jawan, who was found dead after a sting video on the "abuse" of buddy system in the army, were laid to rest in Kollam district of Kerala after a fresh autopsy was conducted following insistence of his family, who raised doubts over this demise.
The Congress high command on Thursday approved the list of its candidates for Lok Sabha polls in Kerala retaining all but two sitting MPs, including Union Ministers Shashi Tharoor and K V Thomas, giving a head start to the party in the campaign against rival Left Democratic Front.
The longest-serving state party president since October 2010, Parameshwara has remained a hardcore loyalist of the party ever since his political debut through the Congress.
Former Kerala minister T H Mustafa was on Thursday suspended from the Congress for calling Rahul Gandhi a "joker" and saying that the party vice-president should be removed if he does not resign in the backdrop of the party's debacle in the Lok Sabha polls.
The Congress unit described Ramesh's suicide an outcome of "targeted harassment" of their rank and cadre to keep them away from the party.
Stoking yet another controversy, the Bharatiya Janata Party in Kerala on Friday described social reformer and Dalit icon Sree Narayana Guru, who belonged to the backward Ezhava caste, as the greatest "Hindu sanyasi" the state has ever seen.
Congress Legislature Party leader and Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) coordination committee chief Siddaramaiah said no one would leave the Congress and there was no disgruntlement either.
Kerala CM Oommen Chandy said the decision to exclude him from the function of unveiling of former CM R Sankar's statue at Kollam by PM Modi was a "painful experience".
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who inaugurated the celebrations, clarified that the Governor was not invited due to "protocol" issues.
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