Here is the lowdown of the each state and parties.
Voting will be held on Thursday for the first phase of Gujarat Assembly elections in 89 seats spread across 19 districts in Saurashtra-Kutch and southern parts of the state where 788 candidates are in the fray.
The Union Budget on Monday evoked contrasting responses in the political arena with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party hailing it as a vision for an 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat' and the Opposition describing it as a 'let down like never before' that was meant to 'deceive' people.
The Central Bureau of Investigation is conducting searches at the home of Supreme Court lawyer Indira Jaising -- who served as additional solicitor general during UPA 2 -- and the offices of Lawyers Collective, an NGO run by her husband lawyer Anand Grover, officials said.
'The main reason is 'they' do not want to see Dalits especially in the morning!'
APCC president Ripun Bora said following discussions with various parties, it has been decided that the Congress will join hands with the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India-Marxist, Communist Party of India-Marxist Leninist and the Anchalik Gana Morcha.
Opposition presidential candidate Yashwant Sinha on Monday filed his nomination papers for the July 18 election, with a host of leaders including Rahul Gandhi, Sharad Pawar, Akhilesh Yadav and Farooq Abdullah accompanying him.
Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan's move to seek the resignation of vice-chancellors of nine universities has kicked up a huge political storm in the southern state with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Monday issuing a stern warning to the Constitutional head asking him not to cross the limits of his powers.
The 69-year-old leader, who is in the custody of the Enforcement Directorate, was taken to ESI hospital at Joka on the southern outskirts of Kolkata for a medical-check up during the day.
While EC Secretary General Umesh Sinha would be visiting Tamil Nadu next week, Deputy Election Commissioner Sudip Jain would be in West Bengal in the coming days, sources said.
The 48-second video purportedly shows some seven to eight paramilitary and police personnel entering the Old Reading Hall and beating students with lathis.
Trinamool Congress floor leader Derek O'Brien was suspended from the Upper House of Parliament on Tuesday for the remaining part of the Winter session after he threw a Rajya Sabha rule book at the Chair.
'People should realise that what we are fighting for today is actually for tomorrow, for future generations.'
An aggressive nationalism debate has been manufactured by the BJP and RSS so that they can force their agenda on the nation. They want to convert a democratic, republic and a secular country into a Hindu rashtra," the CPI-M general secretary said.
The Congress general secretary was joined by leaders like Ahmed Patel, A K Antony, Ghulam Nabi Azad and Randeep Singh Surjewala, besides hundreds of party workers at the India Gate on Monday in a show of solidarity with the students from Jamia Millia Islamia and several other universities across the country protesting the contentious amended citizenship law.
'The government is adopting double standards by allowing foreign envoys to visit Jammu and Kashmir, but not Indian politicians'
AAP spokesperson Bhardwaj claimed participation of over 45000 people in the march despite police bid to foil it.
Protests against 'Agnipath' left Bihar in flames on Friday when rampaging mobs set fire to dozens of railway coaches, engines and stations and torched Bharatiya Janata Party offices, vehicles and other property, prompting the police to suspend internet services in nearly a third of the state.
In a new report, the ADR said the BJP declared a total income of Rs 3,623.28 crore during the financial year 2019-20, but spent only 45.57 per cent (Rs 1,651.022 crore) of it.
The vice president met Leader of the party in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, P Chidambaram and Deputy Leader of the party in Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma, among others and discussed various points regarding the key tax reform legislation.
Interestingly, PM Modi had thanked his UAE counterpart Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum for offering the support to the rain-battered state on August 18.
The Centre has imposed a ban on the Popular Front of India (PFI) and several of its associates for their alleged terror activities.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Saturday said the violence during the Popular Front of India (PFI)-sponsored hartal in his state was 'pre-meditated' and assured strict action against the culprits while his Assam counterpart Hemanta Biswas Sarma batted for banning the Islamist outfit, whom the National Investigation Agency (NIA) accused of encouraging youth to join terrorist groups including the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
The two women, who had earned their daily bread selling lottery tickets on the streets of Kochi, were allegedly sacrificed by the accused to settle their financial issues and bring prosperity in life, police said.
He also mentioned that despite repeated caution by his former Chief Secretary on the ground of contempt of court, his Cabinet took the decision for the ad hoc promotion of the government officials, which is a long-pending issue in the Supreme Court.
Modi said he relied on his 'raw wisdom' to dispel the doubts of the defence experts who had planned the mission.
Pushing efforts to firm up a Third Front, top leaders of the Janata Dal-United, Left and the Janta Dal-Secular met in New Delhi on Monday and decided to convene a meeting of 11 parties after the end of the current Parliament session to give concrete shape to a non-Congress and non-BJP alternative.
"Farmers would like to remind the PM that it is 'andolans' that have liberated India from colonial rulers and that is why we are proud to be 'Andolan-jivi'."
Senior AICC member and former Union minister K V Thomas, who has been at loggerheads with the party's state leadership, on Wednesday said he would campaign for the ruling Left Democratic Front candidate Jo Joseph in the upcoming by-poll in the Thrikkakara Assembly constituency, but reiterated that he would not quit the Congress.
Inarguably the biggest gainer in the Grand Alliance, the CPI-ML, often working in the margins of mainstream politics, had 19 candidates in the fray, most of them students and youth leaders.
RJD president Lalu Prasad will not attend the celebrations due to ill health.
The Bharatiya Janata Party was on Thursday poised for a landslide victory in Gujarat to retain power for a record seventh straight term but was behind the Congress in Himachal Pradesh which could go with the trend of alternative governments in the hill state.
In this year's budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman hiked tax on petrol and diesel, raised import duty on gold, levied additional surcharge on super rich and brought a tax on high value cash withdrawals as she sought to spur growth with reduction in corporate tax and sops to housing sector, startups and electric vehicles.
Referred to as 'Badlav Patr (document of change)', Congress leader Randeep Surjewala and All India Congress Committee's Bihar in-charge Shakti Sinh Gohil presented the manifesto that promises farm loan waiver and 50 percent subsidy in electricity bills to farmers up to 100 units of consumption. The manifesto also promised that it will reject the Centre's farm laws if voted to power.
Among the notable absentees were Congress president Rahul Gandhi, West Bengal chief minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee, Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's M K Stalin, Telugu Desam Party chief K Chandrashekhar Rao, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and Delhi chief minister and Aam Admi Party convenor Arvind Kejriwal.
The Congress quickly hit back accusing TMC of being a 'stooge of BJP' and challenged it to prove its credentials on a 'pan India' platform.
Any adverse electoral fallout in Thrikkakara by-poll may have an impact on Rahul Gandhi because this falls in the state he represents as a member of Parliament and KC Venugopal because it is his home state, reports Shine Jacob.
Jammu and Kashmir has been without an assembly since November 2018 when the then legislative assembly was dissolved by then Governor Satya Pal Malik after the People's Democratic Party-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition government fell apart earlier that year.
Buoyed by the exit polls projections, the party has sent its senior leaders including general secretary Randeep Surjewala and Avinash Pande, chairman of the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee screening committee, to Patna for proper coordination with the allies and possibly also to keep its flock together after the results are declared.
Eight persons died in the early hours of Tuesday after their houses caught fire at Rampurhat in Birbhum district, police said.
