The war of words between Finance Minister P Chidambaram and Arun Jaitley, leader of opposition in the Rajya Sabha, refuses to die.
Union Minister Kapil Sibal on Sunday said Arun Jaitley's reported comment that the Bharatiya Janata Party was using Hindutva as an opportunistic tool has exposed the real face of the party and demand an apology from him. The senior Congress leader also asked BJP veteran L K Advani and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh to tell the nation "what they now think about Jaitley."
Amid unprecedented bedlam, Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde moved the Telangana bill in Rajya Sabha for consideration leading to three adjournments within 30 minutes.
The Union law and justice minister said the government would make every effort for a negotiated settlement on the vexed issue of construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya.
Three top leaders of the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) -- Venkaiah Naidu, Arun Jaitley and Jaswant Singh -- will contesting the coming Lok Sabha elections and manage the party's election campaign instead.
Opposition parties including the Bharatiya Janata Party, the All India Anna Dravida Munetra Kazhagam and Left parties came together in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday to demand revocation of suspension of seven members, but the ruling Congress said those showing disrespect to Chair should express regret before such a move is initiated.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Sunday said that the 'unelected nominees of New Delhi locked up the elected representatives' of the people of Jammu and Kashmir after prominent leaders from ruling and opposition parties were not allowed to leave their houses to prevent them from visiting the graveyard of 1931 martyrs in Srinagar.
The government objected to the demand throwing the Lok Sabha into turmoil, while the Rajya Sabha witnessed ruling party members opposing permission by the Chair to Leader of the Opposition Arun Jaitley to raise the matter.
The government on Friday rejected allegation of phone tapping of the Bharatiya Janata Party leader Arun Jaitley and promised to get the full details of the "unauthorised" obtaining of call details of the leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha.
The government on Wednesday said it wants to bring the bill to set up anti-corruption ombudsman, Lokpal, in Rajya Sabha during the first part of the current Budget session of Parliament.
Jaitley told reporters that allegations by the top two officers of the country's premier investigation agency led to a 'bizarre and unfortunate' situation.
With falling rupee and rising oil prices casting a shadow over Indian economy, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday said the country is faced with a difficult economic situation for which some domestic factors too were responsible.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday slammed Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde for accusing it and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh of running terror training camps and said he should either prove it or apologise.
Procedural wrangles over voting for taking up a discussion on the alleged interference of the government in preparing Central Bureau of Investigation report on the coalgate scam led to a brief adjournment in the Rajya Sabha on Monday.
Virat and Krunal inspired Bengaluru to the top of the table by stitching up an impeccable 119-run stand to safely guide the Royal Challengers through the turbulent phase.
Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajparty Party, which support the United Progressive Alliance from outside, on Wednesday created repeated obstructions in Rajya Sabha, prompting an angry Bharatiya Janata Party to allege that the government has decided not to run the House because of its 'number game'.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani is understood to have indicated that he will not complete his five-year term as the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and make way for his deputy Sushma Swaraj. Highly placed party sources said Advani also conveyed to Arun Jaitley that the latter would continue to be the leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha. Though Advani did not specify when he would hang up his boots, he is unlikely to continue for long.
"It cannot be that the Supreme Court is wrong, the CAG is wrong and only the dynast is right. Satyameva Jayate -- the truth shall prevail. The CAG Report on Rafale reaffirms the dictum," Jaitley said in a series of tweet.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday accused the government of giving 'limited denials' on the telephone tapping allegations and warned that allowing lobbyists to influence policies like telecom spectrum would be 'hugely frightening' for Parliamentary democracy. In a blistering attack on the government, Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley asked whether 'public emergency' or 'public safety' was under threat to bug the telephones of four senior political leaders.
The National Democratic Alliance government made all efforts to bring the alleged Bofors scam guilty to the book, but the successive Congress-led governments tried to "kill" the case, Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley tells Karan Thapar on CNN-IBN's Devil's Advocate show.
In a show of solidarity, Bharatiya Janata Party leader Arun Jaitley on Monday met jailed Rajathan MLA Rajendra Rathore, an accused in Dara Singh fake encounter killing case, and said the party would help him fight his legal battle, while accusing Congress of using the Central Bureau of Investigation to serve its political agenda.
National Security Advisor Shiv Shankar Menon on Tuesday briefed senior Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sushma Swaraj and Arun Jaitley on the ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops along the Line of Control.
New Delhi is likely to experience a huge traffic jam on Wednesday, as the Bharatiya Janata Party holds a rally to protest against price rise.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday asked Congress to clarify whether it paid Rs 90 crore to Associated Journals, which ran the now-defunct National Herald daily, saying if it was true it was violation of tax and electoral laws.
The finance minister said the economy had been slowing.
Jaitley remained steadfast in not caving in to sustained Opposition pressure.
Debate and accountability must co-exist, says leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley
All are welcome to campaign for the BJP candidate in Amritsar, except one.
Arun Jaitley's maiden effort is a welcome and purposeful change in direction and not UPA redux.
According to Times Now channel, there was a perceived lack of unity among the party leadership and the BJP squarely failed to advertise its agenda among the general public.
Claiming that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and United Progressive Alliance Chairperson Sonia Gandhi are not on the same page, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday said government has to be large-hearted and not act as "big brother" for creating a political consensus, which is key to economic reforms.
A day after her criticism of Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari, Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Thursday changed tune to say that she had 'respect' and 'full faith' in the chair and expressed hope that he will find ways for passage of the bill for quota in promotion.
In an apparent show of unanimity, the report of the Select Committee on Lokpal Bill, which has recommended delinking creation of Lokayuktas in states from the central bill, is scheduled to be tabled in the Rajya Sabha on Friday by Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party.
'Earlier, we used to talk about a deficit economy. There is a deficit in democracy' 'If you read superficially Gandhi and Ambedkar and Nehru, some misconceptions and misunderstanding come to mind, as if they were at loggerheads and they differed radically in their views' 'India is one nation. There is only one citizenship. No citizenship for South India and no citizenship for North India and another for the Northeast'
The finance minister said while the 10 years of the United Progressive Alliance government were characterised by "policy paralysis", the Modi dispensation introduced structural reforms to make India a developed nation and give it a cleaner economy.
The government on Monday told the Rajya Sabha that the United States has assured that it would not approve opposition to business outsourcing to countries like India brought in through legislations by New Jersey
Delhi Capitals looked like a well-oiled machine with four wins in a row before a stunning batting meltdown against Mumbai Indians halted their momentum.
The Delhi chief minister also said the sports bodies should be free from politicians and be handled by professionals.
Unruly scenes were witnessed in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday after the opposition members raised the issue of alleged phone tapping of senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Arun Jaitley, leading to a brief adjournment of the House.
Keeping the United Progressive Alliance government in the line of fire on Indo-Pak Sharm-el Sheikh joint statement, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's praise of Atal Bihari Vajpayee cannot shield him from his 'monumental lapse' in reversing India's consistent stand on Pakistan.
