Upset over political developments in Maharashtra, the Congress and other opposition parties boycotted Constitution Day celebrations in the Central Hall of Parliament and held a joint protest in front of the Ambedkar statue inside Parliament complex.
Former Chief Minister Panneerselvam could muster only 11 votes, ending the prolonged stalemate triggered by his rebellion.
As the Opposition held its first meeting on the Presidential polls and names of Farooq Abdullah and Gopalkrishna Gandhi also cropped up, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party reached out to several parties across the political spectrum to build a consensus choice with senior party leader and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh speaking to Sharad Pawar, Mallikarjun Kharge (Congress), Mamata Banerjee (Trinamool Congress), Akhilesh Yadav (Samajwadi Party) and Naveen Patnaik (Biju Janata Dal).
Vijayakanth's DMDK may play a key role as Tamil Nadu's political parties scramble for allies to capture the state's 40 Lok Sabha seats.
Without strategising together, Jayalalithaa's successor, Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami, and M Karunanidhi's son-cum-successor, M K Stalin, have used tough-talking on seat-sharing with allies, to replace charisma that they purportedly lacked, during the run-up to the assembly polls scheduled for April 6, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Opposition, which had been demanding that the bill be referred to a 'joint select committee', staged a walkout when its demand was rejected by the government.
It is not unlikely that ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP government comes up with more imaginative schemes aimed at constituency-building. The party under Modi's leadership has a more modern thinking in such matters unlike its rivals, which are still steeped only in ideology, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Police later let the legislators off after a brief detention at a marriage hall. Stalin demanded the dismissal of the AIADMK government over the issue of the alleged pay-offs.
The Congress on Friday said it did not participate in the Constitution Day event in the central hall of Parliament in protest and to remind the country that the Constitution is not being respected and is being undermined instead.
By aligning with the BJP, even if they were arm-twisted into doing so, the AIADMK leadership has yielded their political space in the state to the aunt-nephew duo of Sasikala-Dinakaran, and the parliamentary election to the DMK-Congress combine, says A Ganesh Nadar.
Following the address by President Ram Nath Kovind, the economic survey will be tabled in the two Houses.
Rajya Sabha also rejected an opposition sponsored motions to send the bill to a select committee of the House and for making triple talaq a civil offence with 100 votes against it as compared to 84 in favour.
'Human trafficking from Bangladesh is a regular phenomenon and those people come here to work or in search of greener pastures. They are all over the country. We are giving them legal recognition and making them citizens so that they don't have to live in fear,' says R Nataraj, AIADMK MLA from Tamil Nadu.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier called for consensus in passing the bill.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati and Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, who have extended support to the Congress to form the government in the state, were not present.
"It is a historic day. We are making history today," Law Minister said.
'Chief Minister Palaniswami is meeting Modi on December, 19, he may mention Tamil refugees when he talks to him.'
Vellore is one of the two seats that the DMK alliance won by the narrowest of margins in 2019. For the DMK's vote-score to be so low in a constituency with a substantial Muslim population has not missed the BJP strategists' eyes, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
For now, the DMK can be expected to sound the bugle for Opposition unity at the national level, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
Opposition parties, though resigned to the fact that they lack the numbers to defeat or stall the bill in the two Houses, have decided upon different tactics that they would employ to highlight their reasons for opposing it.
Who are the NGOs in India with maximum funding in India? Which are the countries funding them? How many NGOs are registered under the law? Vicky Nanjappa finds out.
"The RSS is trying to change the nature of India. Other parties haven't tried to capture India's institutions," he said.
With the Modi government battling propriety issues over the Lalit Modi row and the furore on Vyapam scam, leaders of "like-minded" parties will meet for Congress president Sonia Gandhi's Iftar dinner on Monday where they are likely to deliberate on the strategy for Parliament session beginning July 21.
After a 6.5-hour debate, the upper house clears the bill. Amit Shah said the bill is not anti-Muslim and Indian minorities have nothing to fear from its passage.
A 7-hr debate was held over the contentious bill. Oppn amendments rejected.
For now, the BJP's strategy for Khushbu seems to be one of denial -- denying the rival Congress in the state and also at the national-level a Muslim voice acceptable to Hindu audiences and TV news-watchers. This is much less than the induction of DMK veterans like Duraiswamy and Selvam, who still have a greater chances of winning assembly seats,, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Owaisi said the CBI should appeal against the judgment "to protect its independence."
In a meeting with the President on behalf of these 18 non-National Democratic Alliance parties, Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad said he has requested the President to return the bills, and only give his assent after they have been passed after following proper rules and procedures.
A united Opposition in the Lok Sabha on Thursday pitched for referring the triple talaq bill to a 'joint select committee' of Parliament, claiming its provisions were unconstitutional.
Amid a stalemate between the government and the Opposition over the issue, the House failed to transact any significant business and was adjourned for the day.
'You know the difference between being brought up by a mother and a step-mother?' 'As long as Amma was there we had nothing to fear. Now the step-mother is there and we are on the streets.'
'We are a national party that wants to remind people about Bharatiya sanskruti, which, at the moment, is being remote-controlled by an Italian lady and her agents,' says former Union minister O Rajagopal, the BJP candidate from Thiruvananthapuram who will challenge Shashi Tharoor.
As of now, there is nothing to suggest that the 'Michaelpatti episode' has the potential to polarise Dravidian Tamil Nadu on religious lines, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Declaring that he has no ambition of becoming prime minister, Pawar is holding Rahul Gandhi's hand, reassuring Mayawati and reaching out to Mamata Banerjee, reports Aditi Phadnis.
Governor E S L Narasimhan administered the oath of office and secrecy to the 46-year-old leader, whose party emerged victorious in 151 seats in the 175-member strong state assembly.
During the meeting, the parties also decided to unitedly move forward in fielding a joint candidate for the post of deputy chairman of Rajya Sabha, which fell vacant after the retirement of P J Kurien on July 1.
Is Stalin positioning himself as a central figure in the anti-Bharatiya Janata Party, anti-Narendra Modi formation?
'He just said that those who cannot control the violence should go. He did not name the BJP.'
'It would be interesting to see how Yogi Adityanath is received in Tamil Nadu, where he is due to end his Ram Rajya Rath Yatra in Rameswaram on March 23.'
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Monday said the government has no other option but to extend President's Rule in Jammu and Kashmir as the Election Commission wants to hold assembly elections in the state by the end of 2019.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances