'The path of militant Hindutva that the BJP's national leadership chose as its main electoral plank literally dug the grave for the party in Kerala,' says M K Bhadrakumar.
A controversy erupted on Tuesday after the opposition parties tagged a video of DMK leader A Raja purportedly showing him making remarks that India has never been a nation, but a subcontinent with diverse practices and cultures, prompting strong response from the BJP which described the comments as a call for 'balkanisation' of the the country and demanded for his arrest.
In the five years in politics Priyanka Gandhi has undeniably emerged as a thorn in the BJP flesh, notes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay. It is time that this thorn is twisted a wee bit more when the elections have become far more uncertain than what it was when the Election Commission announced the poll schedule.
Devaswoms are meant to manage temples, not the faithful. Why didn't they simply stick to their set of responsibilities and execute it well and efficiently?, asks Shyam G Menon.
The Uri terror attack in which 18 soldiers were martyred will be deliberated in the council, said BJP General Secretary Ram Madhav.
What was shocking was the execution of the killings -- calculated, gory and intended to send a chill down the spine.
'How come the BJP won even in the Muslim belt? I am 100% sure that the BJP would not win in the Muslim belt.'
The incident comes close on the heels of a series of sporadic clashes between CPI-M and BJP workers in the past few months in northern Kannur district.
The opposition party also said that it would like to remind the BJP that Hindu Mahasabha president Syama Prasad Mookerjee aligned with Jinnah's Muslim League to form the government in Bengal during the British rule.
'For the last two elections, the Congress manifesto has been thrown into the dustbin.' 'This manifesto will also be thrown into the dustbin.'
'The BJP will not be able to create dictatorship of the kind it is perhaps dreaming of.' 'We have Bengal as the biggest example.'
In the coming days, unless Modi tones down the communal spiel, it will be clear that anxiety continues to drive his mind and clouds his judgment, observes Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The senior police officer said the four, after interrogation, revealed their roles and that the police now knows all the participants, conspirators and collaborators involved in the killing of the RSS leader.
Stalin said one cannot and should not decide the mood of the entire country based on the results of one state elections.
ADGP (Law and Order) Vijay Sakhare told PTI that the police have also taken into custody a person suspected to be involved in the killing of RSS leader Sanjith in the district in November last year.
Every passing day featuring parties within the INDIA alliance sniping at each other at state level is bad publicity for the alliance particularly given the proximity of the 2024 general elections, asserts Shyam G Menon.
The "venom" that the Congress leader has been spewing against the prime minister in his "political frustration" has now turned into an insult to the country, Irani alleged.
She said it was a strange thing for her to know that for the time being he has been disqualified from even fighting another election for eight years.
'The prime minister took a meeting recently and he asked for suggestions and ideas for a plan till 2047.'
The police, in its plea, had contended that the veteran politician violated the bail conditions and, therefore, the bail was liable to be cancelled.
The results will be announced on May 2.
The appointments holds significance as a large number of senior leaders, who had no organisational post currently, have now been given new responsibilities.
Rahul Gandhi said both Rae Bareli and Wayanad "will get two MPs".
BJP MLA Purnesh Modi, complainant in the defamation case against Rahul Gandhi, has filed a caveat in the Supreme Court seeking that he be heard if the Congress leader moves a plea challenging the high court verdict refusing to stay his conviction in the Modi surname remark case.
Sources said senior leaders of the party have been told to reach out to other leaders of the alliance and talks with some parties have begun.
On poll eve, both the BJP and the Congress claimed they were headed towards a majority and would form the government.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Saturday launched a stinging attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi accusing him of not addressing the problem of Manipur even during the debate on the violence in the northeastern state in Parliament a few days ago.
Tourism Minister Kadakampally Surendran criticised those who were trying to give a communal colour to the tourism department tweet on the Kerala delicacy -- "Beef Ularthiyathu" and said in the southern state none links food with religion.
A total of 1,203 candidates, including 109 women, are contesting for the 140 assembly seats in which a total of 2.61 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise.
The accent on 'making the south feel wanted' was the reason why P Muralidhar Rao, who was dropped as general secretary, was partially reinstated in the central apparatus as prabhari in charge of Madhya Pradesh. 'Pressure from the RSS was brought to bear on Rao's return,' a source said. Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
While Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has made his national ambitions amply clear, even rechristening his party to aid the process, his Tamil Nadu counterpart M K Stalin insists he is already in the national scene and used his birthday rally on March 1 to not only strongly pitch for the Congress as a force to reckon with in the efforts to dislodge the Narendra Modi-led dispensation at the Centre, but also sought to shoot down the prospects of a Third Front.
'The moment a new election comes, new guarantees are announced.' 'The BJP is adept at diverting people's attention.'
The high-level committee on 'one nation, one election' approached 62 parties out which 47 responded -- 32 in support of holding elections simultaneously, 15 against it.
'The entire electorate of Wayanad is joyful. Rahulji is with us and we are with him wherever he is.'
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.
Both the BJP leaders asserted that Gandhi's disqualification was a natural outcome of the law as the Supreme Court has made it clear that a lawmaker stands disqualified from the time of his conviction.
The NTA denied any irregularities and said the changes made in the NCERT textbooks and grace marks for losing time at the examination centres were some of the reasons behind the students scoring higher marks.
Despite consumer inflation, joblessness, etc, ordinary voters still think Modi is the best to rule the country.< Going into the poll with a tried and tested prime ministerial candidate is a huge plus for the BJP --- and a huge handicap for the Opposition, points out Virendra Kapoor.
'Can you believe Ashok Chavan was with me in the senior leaders' meeting one day, and next day morning, he switched sides!'
'Metro man' E Sreedharan, a much-admired technocrat who is credited with changing the face of public transport system in the country, will join the Bharatiya Janata Party giving a boost to the saffron party ahead of the assembly polls in Kerala.
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