'She has just one objective. To win the next election. Nothing else matters.'
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday said she is saddened at the loss of lives in "sporadic" incidents of violence during the panchayat elections.
The protest against the alleged sexual abuse of two girls at a school in Badlapur town of Maharashtra's Thane district turned violent on Tuesday as the angry agitators vandalised the school and also indulged in stone-pelting at the local railway station during the 'rail blockade', police said.
'We defeated together in Bengal, now we will defeat in UP. This is a promise to Didi, we will emerge winners. Warm welcome and greetings to Didi in UP,' the SP chief tweeted sharing a picture with Banerjee.
Bose is planning to convert the police outpost near the North Gate of the Raj Bhavan into a 'Jan Manch' (public platform), he said.
The only occasion when the BJP had 100 seats in the Upper House was in 2022.
The draft legislation seeks capital punishment for persons convicted of rape if their actions result in the victim's death or leave her in a vegetative state.
Mamata's 'there is no United Progressive Alliance (UPA)' remark after a meeting in Mumbai with Nationalist Congress Party chief Sharad Pawar, an ally of Congress in Maharashtra, evoked a strong response from the party, currently being led by interim president Sonia Gandhi.
The meeting was attended by 26 participants including Chief Ministers and Lt Governors of UTs, he said while briefing the media.
Sekhar Roy was summoned by the police in connection with a social media post he made over the alleged rape and murder of a doctor at RG Kar Medical College and Hospital.
The governor had opened a 'Peace Room' at the Raj Bhavan to address violence-related complaints from people in districts during the recently held panchayat elections.
Banerjee, who was speaking on a resolution in the assembly against the 'excesses' of the central probe agencies, urged the prime minister to ensure that the agenda of the union government and the interests of his party do not get mixed up.
The decision followed a petition by former deputy superintendent of the medical establishment, Akhtar Ali, who sought an investigation by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) into alleged financial misconduct during the tenure of the college's former principal, Sandip Ghosh.
Chief ministers of three Congress-ruled states -- Karnataka's Siddaramaiah, Himachal Pradesh's Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu and Telangana's Revanth Reddy -- have announced they will not attend the NITI Aayog meeting over alleged bias against their states in the Union Budget.
The Bombay high court on Friday restrained political parties and individuals from proceeding with the Maharashtra bandh scheduled for August 24 or on any future date.
"People ask me why I am now criticising Nitish Kumar, having worked with him in the past. He was a different man back then. His conscience had not been put up for sale," said Kishor, who had managed the JD-U president's election campaign in 2015 and formally joined the party two years later.
The government has convened an all-party meeting on July 21 ahead of the Monsoon Session of Parliament which will start next Monday, the Parliamentary Affairs Ministry said.
The protests by resident doctors at government hospitals in several states across the country ended on Thursday as major doctors' bodies called off their 11-day strike over the rape-murder of a trainee medic in Kolkata after the Supreme Court made an appeal to them to resume work.
The state police have called the scheduled rallies, support for which has been mainly garnered over social media platforms, as "illegal" and "unauthorised", and said they have taken necessary precautions to allay apprehensions about potential law and order situations during the march.
In a first since last year's state elections, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Friday held a 'courtesy meeting' with Leader of the Opposition Suvendu Adhikari at her chamber in the state assembly, raising eyebrows in political circles.
>Rohini Acharya, Lalu Yadav's daughter who donated her kidney to her father in December 2022, is on her introductory campaign trail in the constituency that has been represented by her father four times.
First, Mamata's pampering of lawless elements masquerading as Trinamool Congress cadres. Second, her promotion of her nephew, Abhishek Banerjee, as a possible successor and the adoption of Prashant Kishor as her political adviser. Neither has gone down well with either her followers or the public, observes Amulya Ganguli.
With Atishi at the helm it will not be easy for the BJP to continue using the LG's office and the bureaucracy as political instruments to hinder governance and thereby provoke the electorate's ire against the AAP, expects Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
The announcement is seen as a bid to assert Banerjee's control over the party, and stem dissension between a section of TMC's old guard and the next generation leaders.
Banerjee, while addressing a convention of party workers and leaders, said her party's cadres have to reach out to the people to counter canards spread against the TMC by opposition parties.
Though the BJP is running too close for comfort, populist schemes and support among Muslims may help Mamata Banerjee overcome the challenge, observes Aditi Phadnis.
She lashed out at the BJP and Leader of Opposition in West Bengal assembly, Suvendu Adhikari, for "threatening" Trinamool Congress leaders with arrests by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate.
Although no fresh arrests were reported in the case, the Central Bureau of Investigation continued with its questioning of top officials of the RG Kar Hospital.
The bench agreed to hear the plea on Friday and told Singhvi to ask his junior counsel to go to the mentioning officer.
A contractual woman employee, who has alleged molestation by West Bengal Governor C V Ananda Bose, has moved the Supreme Court against 'blanket immunity' conferred to him under Article 361 of the Constitution.
The Bombay high court on Wednesday refused to grant any relief to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in a complaint seeking action against her for allegedly disrespecting the national anthem at an event in Mumbai in 2022.
Chanting 'Justice for RG Kar' and 'Justice for our sister', hundreds of IT professionals took to the streets of Sector V in Salt Lake, the city's IT Hub, protesting against the rape and murder of a post-graduate trainee doctor at RG Kar Hospital.
"I am ready to fight the money power (of her political opponents), and (central) agencies (which her party alleges has been unleashed on TMC with a political motive), but I will not bow my head," she said.
Banerjee, who lost the election in Nandigram, has to win this bypoll to retain the chief minister's post.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) will conduct a psychological assessment of Sanjay Roy, the accused in a rape-and-murder case of a doctor in Kolkata that has triggered nationwide protests, officials said on Saturday.
Amid demands for a separate state carved out of Bengal by some Bharatiya Janata Party leaders, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday asserted that she is ready to shed her own blood, if need be, to thwart attempts to divide the state.
The body of a woman post-graduate trainee who was allegedly raped and murdered inside a seminar hall of the hospital, was found on Friday morning. The civic volunteer was arrested on Saturday.
Banerjee also said she was curious over why the BJP-led central government was 'worried' about her meeting Hasina.
Independence Day was celebrated across states and Union territories on Thursday, as several chief ministers announced job schemes while some others vowed their support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of a Viksit Bharat by 2047.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday said she has blocked Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Twitter, 'disturbed' by his regular posts against her government on the microblogging platform.
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