Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, the Congress on Wednesday announced five guarantees for women, including annual direct cash transfers of Rs 1 lakh to one woman from each of the country's poorest families and 50 per cent quota in all new recruitments in central government jobs.
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.
Few in Varanasi expect the result to be different from 2014 and 2019. The only point of interest is whether Narendra Modi will increase his winning margin against his rivals.
'My primary point was where is the Mamata Banerjee who jumps and reaches out, starts talking directly and starts solving over the heads of the bureaucracy.'
The party managed only 52 seats on its own and many of its top leadership, including Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge and Jyotiraditya Scindia were defeated in the polls.
"The Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy was done successfully to remove stones from her gall bladder. She is now keeping well," TC Mahila Congress president Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar and the nursing home sources said.
Over four months after her surgery in the United States for an undisclosed ailment, a cheerful Sonia Gandhi took everyone by surprise by joining a group of tribal women in their traditional dance in New Delhi on Friday.
The Congress on Thursday slammed the Centre after a May 4 video of two women being paraded naked in Manipur surfaced, with party president Mallikarjun Kharge accusing the Narendra Modi government of turning democracy into 'mobocracy'.
The opposition party vowed to hit the streets against the "Modi-made inflation" and run a people's movement over price rise.
He pointed out that wages under the NREGA have been increased from Rs 61 to Rs 100 which would lead to earnings of Rs 10,000 annually 'irrespective of qualification'. Mukherjee, who is the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee chief urged party workers to pinpoint failures in implementation of the scheme at the block and panchayat levels.
The firestorm that Kangana Ranaut kicked with her comment that the Independence India won in 1947 was bheek intensified on Friday with leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party and other parties demanding action against the actor even as a complaint was filed against her while some people took to the streets to burn her effigies.
The interim panel headed by him would take the place of the Congress Working Committee, the apex decision-making body, till a new CWC is formed after Kharge's election is ratified at the party plenary.
Both the Congress and its women's wing 'Mahila Congress' were livid and demanded apology from the prime minister.
The Congress on Monday slammed Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar for his "deplorable" remarks against Sonia Gandhi and demanded an unconditional apology from him.
The nation on Saturday remembered former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on her 31st death anniversary with President Pranab Mukherjee, Vice President Hamid Ansari and other leaders paying tributes at her memorial in New Delhi.
A senior party leader on the condition of anonymity said the CWC meeting will be called next week although the agenda is to be worked out and finalised.
Legendary singer K J Yesudas has suggested that women should avoid wearing jeans, saying it goes against Indian culture.
He was trolled during the Lok Sabha poll campaign, but despite the tactics by his rivals, action hero Suresh Gopi rose to national stardom in cinema style on June 4, winning the Thrissur seat on a BJP ticket and scripting history for the saffron party in Kerala.
The MLAs who joined the BJP were Ngamthang Haokip, Y Surchandra Singh, S Bira Singh MLA and O Lukhoi Singh.
As the raids were completed, the I-T team took two managers of the distillery located at Sutapada to an unknown location for interrogation, they said.
Facing flak over his "ripped jeans" comment, Uttarakhand Chief Minister Tirath Singh Rawat on Friday said he apologises for the remark if it has hurt anybody.
Hundreds of rural women who gathered to collect forms for a newly announced government scheme in Jorhat district of Assam left their queues to greet Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who was leading the 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra' through the area on Thursday.
In the first phase of the Lok Sabha polls, there were 135 women candidates while in the second phase, there were 100 women candidates, bringing the combined total for the first two phases to 235 women candidates.
The attack, resulting in arson and vandalism, took place when Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma was holding a meeting with leaders of Achik Conscious Holistically Integrated Krima (ACHIK) and Garo Hills State Movement Committee (GHSMC), who were fasting to press for their demand to make Tura the winter capital of the northeastern state. The CM, who was inside the building, was not injured in the violence.
'If she manages to throw out people, go for surgical operations, clean up her image, she will be victorious.'
The electoral battle in Varanasi, according to locals and political experts, is not about whether the PM will win for a third successive occasion, but if he will increase his share of the votes polled and his win margin.
Government was watching Gandhiji's mood to know if he had cooled down. They found out from his letters and utterances that he was the same old firebrand and even more determined than before.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday received wholehearted support from a group of women from the troubled Sandeshkhali area who met her after a Trinamool Congress rally in Kolkata, party sources said.
Minister of State Prahlad Singh Patel on Monday posted on social media platform X that the Union Cabinet has approved the women's reservation bill, but deleted the post within an hour.
The best-case scenario is that the BJP will top out at around 50 seats in UP -- a drop of 12 from the 62 it had won in 2019. Taken in tandem with Maharashtra and Karnataka, this is what is likely to put paid to the BJP's ambitions of a third term for Modi, argues Prem Panicker.
Pawar also announced a panel of senior party leaders to draw a future course of action. Party workers and leaders, however, demanded that Pawar withdraw his decision.
'The mob asked for proof. I showed them the book I was reading Hindu Nationalism: A Reader'
The party's research department is quietly collecting data, facts and figures to puncture the Modi government's claims on the note ban, the goods and services tax, and the economic growth.
Gandhi has written the letter, seeking passage of a resolution urging the central government to pass the bill, to the chief ministers of those states where the Congress is in power.
Gandhi had decided not to celebrate her birthday because of rape incidents and assaults on women in the country.
The 47-year-old scion of the Nehru-Gandhi family will face the daunting task of restoring lost glory to the party whose fortunes have been dwindling in the recent past.
The Congress alleged that Delhi Police personnel forcibly entered its headquarters and beat up party workers and leaders on Wednesday, on a day the party staged vociferous protests against the questioning of Rahul Gandhi by the Enforcement Directorate for the third consecutive day.
Doctors have advised the 85-year-old politician to stay in home isolation.
Days after he quit Congress and created a controversy by taking down the website of the party state unit, Sanjay Puri on Thursday joined Aam Aadmi Party along with scores of Janakpuri block Congress workers.
At a time when senior Congress leaders are shying away from contesting the April 24 Lok Sabha elections in Tamil Nadu and despite a lack of enthusiasm among cadres, there is a race to get tickets to contest from select constituencies perceived as "winnable", party sources said.
