The incident occurred on the Alappuzha-Kannur Executive Express train in which two months ago a man had set fire to his co-passengers, which resulted in three deaths including a toddler, leading to speculation that it might be a case of sabotage and connected to the earlier one.
The warmth and respect for India were evident wherever I went and noticed how most Latin Americans have Indian gurus either directly or online and yoga was very much in vogue, observes Ambassador T P Sreenivasan.
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.
Throwing its weight behind actor-cum-MLA M Mukesh, the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist in Kerala on Saturday said that he need not resign from his post as legislator merely because a rape case has been registered against him.
Another former Congressman and the current BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla said nothing has changed in the Congress since he was 'forced out' of the party for 'speaking against dynasty'.
The man was caught from near the Aluva bridge on Thursday evening where he was drinking alcohol. The suspect attempted to escape from the police by jumping into the nearby river and swimming away, but was caught with the help of local residents and pulled out of the water.
There are lessons for the Congress to learn from the Karnataka elections of how burying the hatchet among top leaders and not washing dirty linen in public can help, says Ramesh Menon.
The BJP is focusing determinedly on the seats it lost in 2019, with the hope of winning these either independently or with the aid of its allies.
Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Congress MP Shashi Tharoor were also present with the PM as he interacted with the students inside the train.
Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is expected to visit Wayanad in Kerala on June 12, party sources said on Monday.
Apparently rattled by Congress MP Shashi Tharoor's Malabar tour, Leader of Opposition in the Kerala assembly, V D Satheesan on Tuesday said any kind of sectarianism or parallel activities would not be allowed in the party and warned that such moves would be dealt with 'seriously'.
Against the backdrop of Kerala's appetite for commonsense, it was assumed that this controversy would pass. Respect for rationalism and scientific outlook is strong in the state despite political forces gnawing at it for their own goals, observes Shyam G Menon.
A skillful organiser and shrewd strategist with the man-next-door image, 67-year-old Oommen Chandy has been a key player in the Congress in Kerala for over four decades.
He said, during a press meet in Kannur, that during the LS polls, alliances were being formed in various states as part of the platform and its result was that the Bharatiya Janata Party was being largely isolated.
The LDF lost Kochi and Thrissur corporations but managed to retain power with a wafer-thin margin in Thiruvananthapuram and held sway over Kollam city civic body with a comfortable majority.The UDF swept the municipalities in Malappuram, Kottayam and Idukki district and also put up an impressive performance in Ernakulam, Wayanad and Kasargode.
'Kerala is on a par with global standards.'
The direction came on an application filed in a suit by Congress member Pridhwyraj P, who was suspended from the party in 2019, seeking directions to quash the suspension order on the ground that it was in violation of the party's rules and by-laws.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Thiruvananthapuram member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor, star campaigner for the Congress-led United Democratic Front in the Kerala assembly elections, speaks to Shobha Warrier about all things political
The court said that in the instant case the investigating officer adopted a "lethargic attitude" throughout the investigation.
A CBI court in Kerala sentenced 10 individuals to life imprisonment for the murder of two Youth Congress workers in 2019. Four others, including a former CPI(M) MLA, received five years in prison. The court found the accused guilty of murder and criminal conspiracy, citing political rivalry as the motive. The case involved the deaths of Kripesh and Sarath Lal P K, who were allegedly killed by CPI(M) workers in Kasaragod district. The verdict sparked reactions from both the Congress and CPI(M), with the Congress calling it a blow to the CPI(M)'s violent political culture and the CPI(M) challenging the verdict and claiming political motives in the CBI investigation.
Harping on putting up a united front, the Congress alleged that democracy is being "mercilessly murdered" and MPs who raise people's issues are suspended from the House.
Given the possibilities that next year's assembly elections could throw up, Stalin told the state assembly that an interim report had to be submitted by January 2026. The outcomes may well find its way into the DMK's poll manifesto, thus seeking to keep the electoral focus still on the BJP-ruled Centre and Prime Minister Modi, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Voting for the second phase of Lok Sabha polls will be held on Friday for 88 seats in 13 states with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi seeking a second-straight term from Wayanad in Kerala.
'Found a ponnada in the appropriate India colours to honour him with!'
Tension gripped Kerala as an unidentified person allegedly hurled an explosive substance at the state headquarters of the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist on Thursday night.
Modi hit out at the Congress for its president Mallikarjun Kharge's attempt to play down his party's poor show in the polls by describing it as "small state elections".
Biju Ramesh's campaign may be different from what voters in Kerala are used to. But he is determined to do things his way... or rather, Amma's way.
The temple authorities reportedly decided to withdraw the umbrella from display after leaders of the Congress and the Communist Party of India-Marxist raised an objection.
On the education details of the candidates, the survey said 669 have declared their education qualification to be between 5th pass and 12th pass, while 380 have declared having an educational qualification of graduate or above, 29 have declared themselves to be simple literates and 7 have declared to be illiterate.
'Kerala voters vote from their mind rather than their heart.'
A Congress delegation will meet the Election Commission on Friday to submit a petition against PM Narendra Modi for his 'divisive and intemperate remarks' used in Kerala.
An average voter turnout of 20 per cent was recorded in the first four hours of voting in the bypolls to 15 assembly seats spread across Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Kerala and Uttarakhand on Wednesday amid an incident of stone pelting in a village in UP's Meerapur and allegations of police personnel deterring voters from casting their ballot.
Union Minister Suresh Gopi on Wednesday described former PM Indira Gandhi as the 'mother of India' and late Congress Chief Minister K Karunakaran as a 'courageous administrator'.
The Kerala police on Thursday launched an investigation into an alleged social media campaign against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan's Facebook post requesting help for the people affected by the landslides in Wayanad district. The campaign was aimed at motivating people to reject the CM's appeal for disaster relief, it said.
In yet another blow to the Congress in poll-bound Kerala, All India Congress Committee member and Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee vice-president K C Rosakutty on Monday resigned from the party's primary membership and decided to associate with the ruling CPI(M)-led LDF.
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.
If the DMK is able to sustain the momentum until the assembly polls, the AIADMK especially and the PMK and possibly the infant TVK too would find it hard to sign up with the BJP, explains N Sathiya Moorthy.
This negated the gain of more than a dozen seats in Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala.
