'We are not opposed to any Indian language. We are against Hindi imposition.'
Three Lok Sabha MPs, including its former Telangana president Bandi Sanjay Kumar, figured on Sunday in the BJP's first list of 52 candidates.
'If these two parties come together, there could be amalgamation of OBC, Dalits and Muslim votes.'
BJP's loss of power in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattigarh means that it will have to face a resurgent Congress in the three states where it had emerged victorious in 62 of 65 Lok Sabha seats.
While the Apna Dal said it was 'free to make its own decision', the SBSP went a step ahead asserting that its option to join the SP-BSP alliance.
There are 64 vacancies in the legislative assemblies of various states and one in Lok Sabha.
Actor-politician Kamal Haasan on Wednesday said discussions were on for his party Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM)'s political alliance and stressed it would support any bloc that would 'selflessly' think about the nation but desist from being part of 'feudal politics'.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rejigged his team only once, in July 2021, in his second term, unlike in his first stint, when he reshuffled and expanded his council three times.
The Bharatiya Janata Party appeared to cede ground in Uttar Pradesh where Samajwadi Party was leading on six of the 11 Assembly seats where bypolls were held while it was neck and neck with Congress in Gujarat and behind in Rajasthan, exactly four months after it swept the three states in Lok Sabha elections.
"You don't change party leadership for losses in one or two elections. The leadership is ideology. They make teams. Our team failed there (in UP)," he said.
Modi's BJP has promised more revdis or freebies for these assembly elections than ever before, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Loss of power in Bihar has upset the Bharatiya Janata Party's calculations for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls but a section of its leaders also see a chance for the party to break the dominance of regional parties in the state, like it has in Uttar Pradesh.
Buoyed by Samajwadi Party's performance in the by-elections, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday said people of the state have shown the door to divisive and communal forces.
'They (BJP) can claim of winning even 82 seats, despite the fact that Uttar Pradesh has only 80 seats'
The Union minister asked Gandhi to "follow the law "and secure acquittal from a higher court.
Anupriya Patel, Pankaj Chaudhary and B L Verma are from the Other Backward Classes, which BJP leader in UP say make up 50 per cent of voters in the state. Three others -- Kaushal Kishore, Bhanu Pratap Singh Verma and S P Singh Baghel -- are from the Scheduled Castes category. Ajay Kumar is the lone Brahmin in this batch of ministers from the state.
Moderate to high turnout on Saturday marked the bye-elections held in three Lok Sabha and 33 assembly constituencies spread across 10 states in an exercise seen as yet another key test of the Narendra Modi government's popularity since it assumed power in May.
If the party is unable to do well in Gujarat and Karnataka polls, it could lose this status in the subsequent binneial elections to the upper House.
In a stunning blow to the BJP on Wednesday, the party lost bypolls to all the three Lok Sabha seats it contested, including its bastion Gorakhpur, and Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh, besides Araria in Bihar.
Hours before the ceremony, Saini visited the Valmiki Bhawan and offered prayers at a gurdwara and the Mansa Devi temple in Panchkula.
According to some of those present in the meeting, Mayawati also referred to the family feud in the Yadav clan, saying after Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav's younger brother Shivpal decided to contest separately the community votes were not transferred to the BSP, and the SP could not even save its "family seats".
'The BJP has started a war-like situation against farmers and the Jat community.'
The Enforcement Directorate on Tuesday questioned former Indian cricket team captain and Congress leader Mohammed Azharuddin for over nine hours in a money laundering case linked to alleged financial irregularities in the Hyderabad Cricket Association, official sources said.
The reshuffle is likely to take place after the ongoing Budget session ends on April 12, reports Archis Mohan.
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Scores of Bharatiya Janata Party workers and supporters of riot-accused Member of Legislative Assembly Sangit Som burnt effigy of party president Rajnath Singh Muzaffarnagar in protest against denial of Lok Sabha ticket to the legislator.
Manoj Tiwari is the only sitting MP whom the BJP has retained.
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 poll panel has asked him to respond to the notice before 5 pm on Friday.
The decision to roll back the farm laws will go a long way in placating the community, which had backed the saffron party wholeheartedly in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls besides the 2017 assembly polls, and may queer the opposition's pitch for forging a social alliance of Jats and several smaller communities with Muslims, another numerically strong group in the region, against the BJP, its leaders hope.
Assembly polls in Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim and Odisha will be held simultaneously in the first phase.
"The court of Additional Sessions Judge/First MP-MLA Court Durgesh also imposed a fine of Rs 5 lakh on Mukhtar and Rs 1 lakh on Afzal," ADGC Criminal Neeraj Srivastava said.
Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) MPs, including Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress Parliamentary Party chief Sonia Gandhi and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi, staged a protest in Parliament premises on Wednesday over the alleged discrimination against opposition-ruled states in the Union Budget.
Congress's UP chief ministerial candidate Sheila Dikshit and Ghulam Babi Azad will also be present in the roadshow.
The Uttar Pradesh chief minister dismissed reports about the possibility of the dissolution of the state assembly, in view of dissidence in BJP, as 'rumours'.
Gandhi has given an adjournment notice in the Lok Sabha for discussing the SIT report in a case of violence in Lakhimpur Kheri
Modi can abandon the path of Hindutva only at risk to his position within his own fraternity. But if he pursues a hard line, he faces the risk of being hauled up by his coalition-partners. For the first time in a decade, Modi is not in enviable situation, observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister and former state BJP president Keshav Prasad Maurya had also dropped a hint in a recent tweet, saying Yaduvanshi (Yadavs), Ravidasiyo (Jatavs) and Pasmanda Muslims will be brought closer to the BJP so that the lotus 'blossoms' in every booth in UP.
The oath taking ceremony will be on March 19 at 5 pm and all national leaders of the party will attend the ceremony.
Her name figures among the 40 star campaigners that the Congress has finalised and forwarded to the Election Commission on Tuesday for the first phase of Uttar Pradesh polls.
1581 MPs with criminal background will elect next President of India.
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