Union ministers Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal, Randeep Surjewala and Jairam Ramesh of the Congress and Shiv Sena's Sanjay Raut were among the 16 candidates elected to the Rajya Sabha from four states where polling was held on Friday after tussle over cross voting and alleged breach of election rules delayed the counting by around eight hours in Maharashtra and Haryana.
Voting will be held on Thursday in bypolls to seven assembly seats in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
rivals Congress, JMM and TMC and Samajwadi Party.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's bypoll win in four of the six seats it contested has invigorated the party ahead of assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday won four seats in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha, while the Rashtriya Janata Dal retained the Mokama assembly seat in the bypolls to seven assembly constituencies in six states.
District nagistrate Ashish Chauhan said the curfew in the 25 villages will be in force from 7 pm to 6 am.
If the corruption issue doesn't claim Mr Baghel, the Congress's chances in the assembly election later this year are good, observes Aditi Phadnis.
Gehlot exuded confidence that all the three candidates of the Congerss will comfortably win.
Gangster-politician Atiq Ahmad, who was shot dead along with his brother at point-blank range, had admitted during questioning by police that he had links with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence and militant outfit Lashkar-e-Tayiba, according to a first information report (FIR).
While 39 members of the all-important panel are general members, it has 32 permanent invitees, including some in-charges of state and 13 special invitees.
The prime minister will be part of the launch of several development initiatives on his birthday.
Chief ministers and other senior leaders made last-minute appeals to voters for their support in Mokama and Gopalganj of Bihar, Adampur of Haryana, Manugoda of Telangana, Gola Gorakhnath of Uttar Pradesh and Dhamnagar of Odisha.
President Droupadi Murmu, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other leaders celebrated Raksha Bandhan on Thursday.
"If there is an image of Lakshmi-Ganesh on our currency (notes), our country will prosper. I will write to (the) prime minister in a day or two on this," he said at a media briefing.
Prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) have been issued in all districts of Uttar Pradesh to prevent any untoward incident.
The Uttar Pradesh police on Saturday filed a chargesheet against 10 persons, including Bahujan Samaj Party legislator Shekhar Tiwari, in the murder of Public Works Department engineer Manoj Kumar Gupta in Auraiya. Tiwari had, on Friday, confessed that he had beaten and tortured PWD executive engineer Manoj Kumar Gupta until he succumbed to his wounds in the early hours of December 24.
The Uttar Pradesh police on Monday arrested two gunmen engaged in the personal security of Bahujan Samaj Party legislator Shekhar Tiwari, who is behind bars for allegedly murdering PWD engineer Manoj Kumar Gupta in Auraiya on December 24. "We suspect Tiwari's gunners Pal Singh and Gajraj Singh, so we arrested them today," UP Additional Director General of Police (law and order) Brijlal said on Minday evening.
'The TMC forgets that if people don't stand by you, your party will never win.'
Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera tweeted, "Shayad meri tapasya mein kuch kami reh gayi (Maybe my penance fell short)."
The additional director general of police (security), however, said in an order on Friday that the security personnel were 'being withdrawn on a purely temporary basis in connection with an emergent law and order duty'.
Opposition parties on Sunday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party after Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar and eight others were inducted into the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government, saying the ruling party's 'washing machine' has resumed its operation to clean tainted leaders and it was an 'ED-facilitated power grab'.
Senior leader P Chidambaram whose Rajya Sabha tenure is ending from Maharashtra is under consideration from Tamil Nadu as the Congress is all set to get the support of alliance partner the DMK. The G-23 leaders, including Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma and Vivek Tankha, are also said to be in contention.
The AAP alleged that 40 of its Delhi MLAs were targeted by the Bharatiya Janata Party with an offer of Rs 20 crore each to switch sides, even as all the 62 of its legislators were accounted for during a meeting at Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's residence.
Here is the lowdown of the each state and parties.
The murder of Atiq and his brother and the police encounter with his son have raised many questions about the propriety of how crime is tackled by the Yogi government. But Yogi knows he has the support of the people who are fed up with crime holding the state to ransom for decades, asserts Ramesh Menon.
'The prowess with which they executed the shootings unmistakably bear the imprint of someone who has had professional training.'
Three TMC leaders Amit Mitra, Bratya Basu and Rathin Ghosh were sworn-in virtually. Mitra is unwell and both Basu and Ghosh are recuperating from COVID-19.
BSP MLA Shekhar Tiwari and his two associates--Manoj Tyagi and another surnamed Bhatia--forcibly entered the house of engineer M K Gupta at Gail Vihar Colony in Diviapur police circle in Auraiya on Tuesday night and started beating him up severely, according to a report lodged with the police by his wife Shashi Gupta.
Both Raghopur and Hasanpur seats will go to polls in the second phase of Bihar elections, on November 3. Notification has already been issued for phase-2 and nomination filing is currently underway.
Amid a brewing political storm in Bihar, the opposition Rashtriya Janata Dal on Monday said it was ready to "embrace" Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and his Janata Dal-United if he broke ranks with the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday appealed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to have photos of Lord Ganesh and Goddess Lakshmi on currency notes.
'Mamata is an emotional person, she follows her heart.' 'We loved that Didi, we still love her, but she is a changed person.' 'Why and how the change happened, who is responsible, I can't say.'
Seeking to consolidate its position in Rajya Sabha, the Bharatiya Janata Party is banking on independents for four additional seats and is seeking to capitalise on the infighting within the Congress in as many states in the June 10 biennial election.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) has once again knocked on the doors of the Supreme Court seeking a direction to the Maharashtra assembly speaker to expeditiously adjudicate the disqualification petitions filed against Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and other Sena MLAs, who had tied up with the Bharatiya Janata Party to form a new government in June 2022, in a time-bound manner.
The land purchased by the trust is located next to the Asharfi Bhawan.
In the brief history of the hill state of Uttarakhand, there has not been a single instance where a chief minister has lost a by-election, reports Shishir Prashant.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal-United said it was the right time to withdraw the general consent to the CBI.
It sent shock waves in the party -- a political greenhorn had taken on Modi in his home turf of Gujarat. Smriti had clearly tried to choose sides, in this case Vajpayee's camp. Many felt that this would end Irani's career. A revealing excerpt from Nidhi Sharma's new book She, The Leader: Women in Indian Politics.
Former Bharatiya Janata Party leader Swami Prasad Maurya on Wednesday said he was not going back to the saffron camp and indicated joining Samajwadi Party on Friday.
Some analysts also pointed out that "outsourcing" political management to regional satraps such as Bhupinder Singh Hooda in Haryana may have proven counterproductive and micromanagement by the Gandhi family was needed.