In the event that like in the 17th Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi again gets locked out of the House, the Congress needs a second-in-command who will keep the momentum going inside Parliament, notes Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
Parliamentarians and legislators across the country voted on Monday to elect India's 15th president, choosing between opposition pick Yashwant Sinha and National Democratic Alliance nominee Droupadi Murmu who is favoured to win the battle to the Rashtrapati Bhavan.
Given the reality of the disparity and the enormous shift over the last 50 years, this can be done without an open and frank conversation with the people, something that has not begun and, knowing the style of our leader, is not expected to begin, asserts Aakar Patel.
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The state is also the biggest market for TVS, another incumbent player, and together with Bajaj Auto, they accounted for 88 per cent of Maharashtra's total electric scooter sales last month. As many as 8,417 units were sold in Maharashtra in September. Bajaj Auto's contribution was 4,048 vehicles and that of TVS was 3,389, according to model- and state-wise data from the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (Siam).
It comes a day after party chief Sonia Gandhi proposed, at a meeting of the Congress Working Committee, the formation of a group to assess the party's losses in Kerala, Assam, West Bengal and Puducherry.
Lok Sabha constituencies that sprung a surprise in the 2024 polls.
'Oommen Chandy always had time for his people and valued their voices.' 'There was no rest for him as long as the betterment of his fellow citizens was at stake.' Ambassador Venu Rajamony, who knew the former Kerala chief minister for half a century, salutes a beloved leader who worked tirelessly for the welfare of its people.
Counting of votes will take place on May 15.
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.
Flaying both the Congress-led United Democratic Front and Bharatiya Janata Party-National Democratic Alliance and a section of the "right wing" media for trying to tarnish the image of the government and its development and welfare programmes, he said the people have rejected their 'vicious propaganda' by giving the Left a decisive mandate.
Governors must be impartial, fair, and above narrow politics to uphold the values and spirit of the Constitution. But in a rapidly changing political culture where the unstated rule is to crush the Opposition, such values have no meaning. At stake are Constitutional values, federalism and governance, asserts Ramesh Menon.
'What authority has a secular government to administer Hindu temples? When Hindu temples are ruled by secular governments, what religious freedom do Hindus have?'
As voters queued up in Kerala to cast their ballot in the assembly polls on Wednesday, Union defence minister and senior Congress leader AK Antony reiterated that the United Democratic Front will come to power in the state with a thumping majority.
The seats identified are from Odisha, West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and the Northeast.
In a setback to the Congress in Kerala, senior party leader K Sudhakaran on Thursday said he would not contest against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan in Dharmadom constituency in northern Kannur district.
Though it's been just five years at the helm, Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress is fighting severe internal dissidence and would crumble like a pack of cards if it loses, says Devanik Saha.
"No explanation can satisfy me," the Governor told reporters in Thiruvananthapuram on Monday evening, a day after making it clear that he would not remain a 'mute spectator' as he sought a report from the Pinarayi Vijayan government.
Why weren't the chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Kerala, Maharashtra and Telangana -- all of which have borders with Karnataka -- not invited to Saturday's swearing-in ceremony, asks Shyam G Menon.
Among the long queues of voters, there were some famous faces too who exercised their franchise.
'The situation in India is much more grave and serious than all of us think.' 'That's why it's important to defeat the BJP in 2024.'
Another meeting convened by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge at his residence in New Delhi on Wednesday with the floor leaders of the INDIA constituents in Parliament will, however, go ahead according to its schedule to formulate the opposition strategy for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The Kerala Government will look into demands for changing the official spelling of the state to 'Keralam' to make it conform to the way it is pronounced in Malayalam, Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan told the Assembly on Wednesday.
UDF, LDF raise voice against cow slaughter ban backed by BJP leadership.
'In each hartal, enormous amount of public money is wasted. The entire state comes to a standstill. How long can this go on?' 'Every year 3 crore people sit at home not because they support hartals, but because they are forced to do so.' 'This is part of a larger measure to curb democratic rights.'
''This chief minister is so obstinate that he is ready to use the police to attain his goal.' 'Had he been more mature rather than obstinate, Kerala would not have reached a boiling point.'
'It is our aim to capture power and rule in Kerala. We may not be able to achieve our target in one attempt.' 'By just hammering once, you will not be able to break a rock; you need to hammer the rock several times.'
The Maharashtra legislative assembly on Thursday unanimously passed a bill which makes Marathi a compulsory subject across all schools in the state. The development came on `Marathi Bhasha Din' (Marathi language day) which is celebrated on February 27, the birth anniversary of poet and Jnanpith award winner late V V Shirwadkar. The state legislative council had passed the legislation, titled `Maharashtra Compulsory Teaching and Learning of Marathi Language in Schools Bill, 2020', on Wednesday.
Leaders of the opposition INDIA bloc are set to meet at the residence of Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge in Delhi on December 6 to formulate a strategy for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
A 29-year-old woman from Bihar, suspected to have links with the alleged recruitment of youths from Kerala to Islamic State, is being questioned in Kerala's Kasaragod by the state police after being taken into custody from New Delhi.
Former West Bengal governor Jagdeep Dhankhar's subsequent elevation set a new benchmark for the actions of those who occupy Raj Bhavans, observes Aditi Phadnis.
'The problem is with those who are entrusted with powers.'
The ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist on Monday took a veiled dig at the Congress by asking it to safeguard its newly elected Karnataka MLAs from being poached by the Bharatiya Janata Party as was allegedly done by the saffron party in Goa amidst the Bharat Jodo Yatra.
The results of blood samples of the student, which were tested at the National Institute of Virology in Pune, have confirmed Nipah, she said.
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.
Congress-led United Democratic Front on Friday managed to wrest power from the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist-controlled Left Democratic Front in Kerala with a wafer-thin majority of two seats in the 140-member Assembly, in the closest poll battle in the state in three decades.
Gandhi also met fishermen and party volunteers involved in relief work.
65-year-old Sathasivam, whose appointment triggered debate in legal and political circles on the propriety of giving gubernatorial assignment to a former CJI, is the 23rd governor of the state.
Senior AICC member and former Union minister K V Thomas, who has been at loggerheads with the party's state leadership, on Wednesday said he would campaign for the ruling Left Democratic Front candidate Jo Joseph in the upcoming by-poll in the Thrikkakara Assembly constituency, but reiterated that he would not quit the Congress.
