'If the BJP doesn't want to accept the will of the people, then we will show them what a majority means.'
MLA Bachchu Kadu had reportedly proposed in the Maharashtra assembly that stray dogs be sent to Assam to control their rising population, as they are consumed by locals in the northeastern state.
'The right conferred by Article 32 has been considered as a part of the 'basic structure of the Constitution', and thus cannot be taken away by anybody, not even by amending the Constitution.'
The ruling Shiv Sena on Wednesday announced the candidature of Sachin Ahir and Aamshya Padvi for the upcoming Maharashtra legislative council polls as it decided against renominating senior leader and state minister Subhash Desai and another party veteran Diwakar Raote for the election to the upper house of the state legislature.
Amid the ongoing tussle between Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole and party veteran Balasaheb Thorat in the wake of recent legislative council elections, both the leaders came face to face at the party's state executive committee meeting in Mumbai on Wednesday, with both of them later claiming that everything was fine between them.
"We will definitely contest it in court. The Shinde faction left the Shiv Sena, then how can they claim that their group is the original party, and not the one led by Uddhav Thackeray. The Thackeray name is synonymous with the Shiv Sena," the Rajya Sabha member said.
Ten Union ministers will be the permanent invitees to the Inter-State Council, according to an official notification.
Known for its abhorrence of Samajwadi Party Member of Legislative Assembly Abu Azmi, Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena is likely to back the Congress candidate in the by-election to the Bhiwandi assembly seat in Maharashtra against the SP leader's son Farhan.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Wednesday said he aspired to become the CM of the state and also took a jibe at his 83-year-old uncle asking when will the Maratha strongman retire from active politics, as he appeared to be ahead in the numbers game for control of the Nationalist Congress Party after its vertical split.
'If you do not attend the meeting, it would be presumed that you have a clear intention of leaving the party'
'At the moment the anti-defection law works only in favour of Uddhav Thackeray's Shiv Sena, the original Shiv Sena.' 'The Eknath Shinde camp is at a disadvantage unless they merge with another political party.' 'Otherwise, they will not be saved (from being disqualified).'
Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole claimed Thackeray had selected a candidate finalised by Congress for the Nashik Teachers' constituency without consulting coalition partners.
The AIMIM leader said that the party "laid certain conditions related to the development of our MLAs constituencies in Dhulia and Malegaon".
The coming weeks are sure to have a lot of drama unfolding in Maharashtra, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
For now, Modi's government appears singularly focussed on demonstrating that it is not in any way inhibited by the BJP's loss of a majority, and will continue along its patented path of bulldozing all opposition and doing just as it likes, asserts Prem Panicker.
If a local court in Mumbai allows former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh and minister Nawab Malik to cast their votes in the June 10 Rajya Sabha elections, the two leaders will be brought to the Vidhan Bhavan, the state legislature complex in Mumbai, at a specific time to take part in the voting process, an official said on Wednesday.
The Nationalist Congress Party on Saturday declared the candidature of Sunetra Pawar, wife of Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, from Baramati Lok Sabha seat, pitting her against sister-in-law and Sharad Pawar's daughter Supriya Sule from the home turf of Pawars.
Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party leader Pankaja Munde on Friday said she was planning to take a break for "one or two months" as she was anguished at her integrity being questioned time and again.
Amid political turmoil in Maharashtra following a revolt by Shiv Sena minister Eknath Shinde, six members of legislative assembly (MLAs) and a member of legislative council (MLC) from the neighbouring state arrived in Gujarat's Surat city on Thursday and were later flown to Guwahati in Assam, where party rebels are camping, in two chartered flights, sources said.
The search operation was suspended around 6 pm on Friday due to heavy rains, an NDRF official said.
Even as the Bharatiya Janata Party won all five seats it contested in the Maharashtra legislative council elections on Monday, Mohit Kamboj, its leader from Mumbai, claimed that three MLAs of the party indulged in "cross-voting".
In a major setback to Maharashtra's ruling alliance of Shiv Sena, Nationalist Congress Party and Congress, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday won three of the six Rajya Sabha seats, while the ruling combine questioned the eight-hour delay in counting of votes.
The MLAs of the three ruling parties and the BJP have reached Mumbai ahead of the elections.
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.
Murmu's vote share is now likely to go past 61 per cent, while it was earlier estimated to be around 50 per cent at the time of her nomination.
Shinde said Patil told him that he did not mean to disrespect the late Sena supremo.
'We were apprising the CM on such issues and he assured us these would stop but in vain'
The crucial, neck-to-neck contest was necessitated as the Bharatiya Janata Party fielded three candidates while Shiv Sena put up two and Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party one each.
'Leave aside the negative fallouts of phraseology like 'urban Naxals' and 'terrorists', both the BJP and the Congress have to re-discover themselves in the context of the 2024 election results, including those of the upcoming ones for Maharashtra and Jharkhand,' observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
President's Rule can be revoked before the six-month period if a situation emerges for formation of a stable government.
'The message the BJP is sending is that they are in no way responsible for Uddhav's downfall and it was only Shinde who is to be blamed.'
Naidu had launched a 'bus yatra' to Babli near the Andhra Pradesh border to start a 'national debate' on the controversial dam across the Godavari being built by Maharashtra.
Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar and senior Congress leader Murli Deora are among the seven candidates from Maharashtra that were on Friday elected unopposed to the Rajya Sabha in the biennial polls in Mumbai.
Hitting out at the opposition BJP over its 'lust for power' and 'dirty politics', Thakur said that Maharashtra has given a new formula to the country. She also said that the Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government was stable.
'Our numbers were less (than BJP's) but PM Narendra Modi blessed us. Modi Saheb told me before the swearing-in that he will extend all possible help to me. Amit Shah Saheb said he will stand behind us like a rock,' Shinde said. 'But the biggest kalakar (artist) is this one,' Shinde said, pointing to Fadnavis sitting to his right on the treasury benches.
Thackeray said the probe will ascertain if the fire was an accident or was the fallout of ignoring an earlier safety report.
The BJP and the Shiv Sena rule the state in coalition, apart from officially being partners in Delhi as well, while also never missing an opportunity to portray each other as a bungler deserving to be dumped.
While the BJP and the Congress have always supported the bill, opposition by other parties and demands from some for quota for backward classes within the women's quota have been key sticking points.
Union Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology Milind Deora on Friday demanded that the judicial commission's report on Adarsh scam should be debated in the Maharashtra legislature.
