The government told the HC that 'Maratha community comprises people belonging to various castes and since the country doesn't conduct caste-based census anymore,' it was proving rather 'difficult' to get hold of the requisite data.
Electioneering ended in Madhya Pradesh at 6 pm except in Naxalites-hit districts of Balaghat, Mandla and Dindori, where campaigning drew to a close early at 3 pm.
Following the party's sweep of assembly elections in three Hindi heartland states against the odds, the BJP's brain trust is now busy game-planning as to how it can improve on its 2019 Lok Sabha election tally of 303 seats.
Various Maratha organisations had held massive 'silent marches' across the state last year for various demands, including reservation.
Rather than a blind reproduction of the government template, a more productive way of enforcing affirmative action in the private sector could be to emulate an American model, suggests Kanika Datta.
There are lessons for the Congress to learn from the Karnataka elections of how burying the hatchet among top leaders and not washing dirty linen in public can help, says Ramesh Menon.
'The Maratha versus OBC friction will increase. A huge chunk of the Shiv Sena's social base consists of OBCs.' Dhaval Kulkarni reports.
No PM ever dared to take the decision. It was Modi with his 56-inch chest who made the move, said Shah.
He is now the first non-Congress chief minister to win a second term in office in the state, seen as a Congress bastion until just five years ago.
Senior state leaders of the two parties pointed to propping up of the "new set of leaders not having much political stature" and lack of communication for the failure to reconcile differences.
'She showed courage at every turn in her political career.'
This time Modi has no emotive message to take to the stump. Muscular nationalism doesn't work against the backdrop of China's successive inroads into Indian territory. Rising prices is a sore point that cuts across class and caste barriers; unprecedented levels of unemployment has the youth in a ferment. This has reduced the BJP campaign to a laundry list of recycled grievances and thinly veiled communal appeals, neither of which are working as well as they have in the past, argues Prem Panicker.
Justice Ghose, the former Supreme Court judge, was on March 19 appointed as the country's first Lokpal, the anti-corruption ombudsman.
'Our legal team is doing their best to argue the matter in the court.'
A BJP source admitted that a census will inevitably reconfirm the numerical majority of the OBCs. 'That will overturn social equations and consign the upper castes to a twilight zone of marginalisation. The RSS won't accept it.' Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
The party also rejigged its Central Election Committee and included former Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, Union Minister Bhupender Yadav, Om Mathur and its women wing chief Vanathi Srinivasan.
The government said it would complete the process of quota for Marathas, which had remained incomplete after the high court stayed it in 2014.
The Uddhav Thackeray-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government in Maharashtra which completes two years in power on November 27 has survived against all odds amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The Lokpal chairperson, all of its eight members and support staff are being allocated space in the hotel premises.
The government has received flak for allegedly shielding the corrupt ministers and slow pace of investigation in irrigation scam.
The Congress won 77 seats or 42% of seats in the 2017 polls. How then can Gujarat be called a BJP bastion, asks Sanjeev Nayyar.
'Was he afraid that his answers during cross-examination would land him in trouble under the new ruling dispensation?'
Brand India's societal divisions and distortions have remained as much relevant in 'liberal' America and Europe as it still is in the structurally stratified Indian society of the 21st century, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Curtains came down on Tuesday evening on campaigning for 57 seats going to poll in the fifth and last phase of bitterly-fought Bihar assembly elections on November five, with acrimonious exchanges provoking showcause notices from the Election Commission to top leaders of rival alliances.
The Congress will only survive if it can transform into something more like the BJP used to be: A coalition of strong state leaders held together by shared ideology or personal loyalty, suggests Mihir S Sharma.
The leaders alleged that those who had no contribution in the freedom struggle wanted to spread fear 'in the name of nationalism', suppress the voice of people and were questioning the legacy of Congress.
Justices Dilip B Bhosale, Pradip Kumar Mohanty, Abhilasha Kumari and Ajay Kumar Tripathi have been appointed as judicial members in the anti-corruption ombudsman.
Community will now avail of exclusive schemes run by the ministry of minority affairs.
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India's fear of small states derives from memories of Partition and the paranoid view that it will break up under 'too many' states. It's time to shed such fears and bite the 'states' reorganisation' bullet. India won't crumble under a few more Telanganas, Vidarbhas or Gorkhalands, says Praful Bidwai.
Caste assertions, including from the upper castes, could have the Sangh Parivar stumble yet again in its efforts to construct a Hindu rashtra.
Narendra Modi government is working for 'making India' whereas the Congress is working for 'breaking India'.
The Civil Services of India continue to be a prestigious avenue for all those dreaming of 'making it'. Here's how you can be an IAS/ IPS officer.
'This is India, bhai. This kind of country does not exist anywhere in the world.'
Rediff.com gives you a look at newbies in the Council of Ministers
'If Lalu puts the agenda of his son's career ahead of the coalition's interest, this coalition will fare very badly.' 'Lalu will ultimately want that his son becomes deputy chief minister but if he's prepared to wait for some time, nothing bad will happen for the coalition,' Professor Prabhat Ghosh, Director, Asian Development Research Institute, tells Archana Masih/Rediff.com
Permissive communalism, as represented by the Sachar Committee report, cannot become the basis to counter the threat of majoritarianism, says D L Sheth.
'The BJP used to be a party of decent, Hindu, middle-class people. Today, it is a party of goons. At the ground level, goons beat you up and at the senior level, the intellectuals justify the beating up.' 'On May 13, one boy sent me an SMS at 2.35 am: "Mayank sir, only five seats, what will happen?" There will be a lot of these idealist kids who want that quick transformation that may not happen. We will have to mentor them. We will have to explain to them that nations cannot be changed like that.' Aam Aadmi Party leader Mayank Gandhi, on the lessons the party has learnt from Election 2014.
The more mud his opponents fling, the stronger Arvind Kejriwal emerges.
'I have never seen anybody disliked more as prime minister than Modi.' 'What is interesting is in his prime ministership, no matter whatever happens in any corner of India, Modi is blamed for it.' 'Modi has not suspended any Constitutional liberties. No Opposition leader has been put in jail... Modi is not Hitler.'
'The voter thinks that the State is not going to impartially deliver services, provide justice, basic law and order, social insurance -- so as a voter it's very rational that I may choose a criminal who will help me navigate the State.' 'A weak State allows a criminal politician to be the person who provides that guarantee to mediate whatever problem the citizen has with the State.'
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