The high octane campaign marked by vitriolic attacks and counter-attacks by political leaders and use of derogatory language and objectionable remarks that forced the Election Commission to step in ended at 6 pm.
The representation of women in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls continues to remain dismally low, as only about 12 percent of the candidates in the fray in the fifth phase are female, according to an analysis by poll rights body ADR.
In the event of the BJP's poor performance in the assembly polls this year and in early 2025, Modi's hold will get further weakened because he will no longer remain the invincible electoral persona tightly controlling the machine at his disposal, asserts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
With six children of Karnataka ministers in the Lok Sabha poll arena, the campaign scene is getting spiced up in the high-stakes elections for the ruling Congress in the state.
A senior SP leader requesting anonymity said that the party chief had called a meeting to brief the MLAs about the voting process of the Rajya Sabha elections.
The third phase of polling will take place on May 7, 2024.
'One needs to understand what kind of means the BJP use to bring other party leaders in their party.' 'They are unscrupulous politicians and money plays an important role.'
Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole claimed Thackeray had selected a candidate finalised by Congress for the Nashik Teachers' constituency without consulting coalition partners.
The party fielded Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur, while Uttar Pradesh minister Jitin Prasada has replaced Varun Gandhi in Pilibhit.
The bypolls were conducted for two Assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh, one each in Meghalaya and Odisha and the Jalandhar Lok Sabha constituency in Punjab.
BJP candidate and former chief minister Bhajan Lal's grandson Bhavya Bishnoi on Sunday defeated his nearest rival and Congress nominee Jai Prakash in the Adampur assembly seat by-election, retaining the family bastion.
'BJP's ultimate ambition is to control Bihar independently.'
Top leaders of 26 opposition parties were arriving in Bengaluru on Monday for a two-day brainstorming session with a call for unity and are expected to chalk out their joint programme aimed at defeating the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's move to get reservation for women in legislatures promises to shape the political discourse ahead of key state polls and Lok Sabha elections, and a parliamentary approval to the long-contested proposal will be used by the Bharatiya Janata Party to burnish his credentials as a decisive leader.
There is a view that heavyweight portfolios like home, finance, defence and external affairs besides education and culture, two ministries with strong ideological hues, will be kept by the BJP, while its allies can get anywhere between five to eight cabinet berths.
Nitish has been engaging with national and regional party leaders in recent months as part of his mission to strengthen 'Opposition unity'.
Yadav struck deals with the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress whenever needed to form or save the governments led by him in Uttar Pradesh.
In a veiled attack on Modi, Rahul said he has never come across a senior public representative who has constantly chosen silence in the face of untold violence against women.
'Episodes of targeted attacks on Muslims established that for a section of people and, sadly, even officials of the State, the election results conveyed no lessons.' 'Opposition parties must not be hesitant in speaking out whenever the mob with tacit State support targets Muslims,' asserts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay, author of Narendra Modi: The Man, The Times.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies on Tuesday welcomed the Union Budget and said it focussed on youth, farmers, women, and has 'substantial allocations' for Maharashtra, but the opposition slammed the annual financial statement, claiming it neglected the western state and only seeks to please the saffron outfit's partners in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh.
Besides the national capital, polling will be held Saturday in 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, all 10 seats of Haryana, eight seats each in Bihar and West Bengal, six seats in Odisha, four seats in Jharkhand and one seat in Jammu and Kashmir. Simultaneously, polling will be held for 42 assembly constituencies in Odisha.
Gupta, along with some other leaders, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party in the presence of Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri and the party's national general secretary Vinod Tawde.
'The water crisis is so obvious that people see no point begging for it from politicians.'
Amid speculation that he may do yet another volte face and return to the National Democratic Alliance, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Saturday visited Buxar district, bordering Uttar Pradesh, to attend a function where senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Union Minister Ashwani Kumar Choubey was also present.
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.
The BJP's outreach to Paswan, son of late stalwart Dalit leader Ram Vilas Paswan, underscores its push to bring him back into the NDA's fold after he walked out of the alliance in Bihar in the 2020 state assembly polls to campaign against Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who was then the BJP's biggest ally.
The rising price of pulses has become a hot issue during the Bihar assembly polls.
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The suspension of 49 Lok Sabha MPs came a day after, a total of 78 -- 33 from the Lower House and 45 from the Upper House -- lawmakers were suspended from Parliament for disrupting proceedings.
Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi held a virtual meeting on Friday evening with leaders of 19 Opposition parties, including the chief ministers of some Opposition-ruled states, amid efforts to boost Opposition unity and evolve a common strategy against the National Democratic Alliance government.
Official sources on Thursday had said the MEA is processing the Karnataka government's request to cancel Prajwal's diplomatic passport. Currently, he is believed to be in Germany.
Forty-two of the 102 Lok Sabha seats going to polls in the general election's first phase are constituencies that have three or more candidates facing criminal cases, according to a poll rights body.
Addressing a joint press conference after a meeting of 26 opposition parties in Bengaluru, Kharge said, "This was a very important meeting to save democracy and the Constitution in the interest of the people of the country."
The INDIA bloc has 95 MPs in Rajya Sabha of which 45 were suspended on Monday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi would have got a tough fight in Varanasi had Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contested against him as Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) candidate, feel party workers from the temple town.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said he wants the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance to win 400 seats in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls to ensure the Congress does not bring back Article 370 in Kashmir and put a 'Babri lock' on the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
The former chief minister also sought to distance JD-S's alliance partner Bharatiya Janata Party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi from the case, amid attacks by the ruling Congress seeking their response on the issue.
Though electoral verdicts have historically been accepted, even though grudgingly, by all parties, there has been a sharper edge to the questions being raised by Opposition parties this time over the polling process, including the Election Commission.
'Till the time you have the equations right the market will remain concerned.' 'If the (coalition) government is taken care of, then probably (the markets will) come back to its rhythm.'
With polls to elect the 18th Lok Sabha approaching, district poll panels are fixing the rates for expenses as part of the election expenditure monitoring process.
