Opposition People's Democratic Party on Thursday accused Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah of dragging the state assembly into the Afzal Guru issue and refusing to take a stand when the clemency resolution came up for discussion in the House.
The Congress continued its losing spree on Saturday posting its worst-ever show in Maharashtra and ending up a distant junior partner to the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha in Jharkhand, further diminishing its role in the opposition bloc as other allies perform better.
Condemning the killing of another youth in Sopore of North Kashmir, Opposition Peoples Democratic Party on Saturday said 'it seems shooting to kill has become a pathological pass time for the state government and its forces.'
With its age-old fascination for education, southern states have done better than the North. Start-ups, IT hubs, and industry majors setting up shop have changed the face of the South. Nearly 79% of global offices set up by international conglomerates in India are in the South. Almost 46% of tech unicorns are from the South. The GDP per person in the South is 4.2 times higher than the North. None of these indicators can be ignored by any central government, whatever the political compulsions, notes Ramesh Menon.
An average voter turnout of 20 per cent was recorded in the first four hours of voting in the bypolls to 15 assembly seats spread across Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Kerala and Uttarakhand on Wednesday amid an incident of stone pelting in a village in UP's Meerapur and allegations of police personnel deterring voters from casting their ballot.
Jammu and Kashmir, chief minister, Omar Abdullah assured the state assembly on Thursday that he will repeal the Armed Forces Special Powers Act and Disturbed Areas Act 'if the situation continued to improve' in Kashmir.
With this kind of coinage, the Opposition seems to be readily conceding the point that Modi is taller than all of them put together. So they need something bigger than themselves, collectively or not, to capture the voter imagination when it is about taking on Modi and the BJP in 2024, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Shigeru Ishiba is expected to prioritise strengthening Japan's military capabilities and fostering deeper international partnerships, particularly with India, with whom Japan shares significant strategic interests, explains Dr Rajaram Panda.
The Congress has tried to inflict capital punishment on true secularism, he claimed, asserting that the Waqf law has no place in the Constitution.
"A total of 808 Kashmir Pandit families, comprising 3445 people are still living in the Valley," he said.
While the results of the bypolls will not directly impact the composition of the 403-member state Assembly, the contest is being seen as a prestige fight between the BJP and opposition parties.
A war of words has broken out between ruling National Conference and Opposition People's Democratic Party in Jammu and Kashmir over posting of pictures on a networking site, caricaturing Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, his father Farooq Abdullah and late grandfather Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah as characters of the film 3 Idiots.
The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Tuesday lambasted the Jammu and Kashmir government for recommending Ghulam Mohammad Mir, a counter-insurgent for Padma Shri award.
Brisk polling was seen for the Wayanad Lok Sabha and the Chelakkara assembly seats in Kerala as they witnessed a turnout of 20.54 and 19.08 per cent, respectively, after the first three hours of voting on Wednesday.
The map displayed by PDP during a power point presentation yesterday showed Aksai Chin and Karakoram region painted in red and part of China and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) in green.
It was a protest which held a mirror to the government of a state taking pride in its commitment to democracy, gender equality and social indices.One person, who in his employed days had known governments and political parties at close quarters, told me that public perception of how the Kerala government handled the ASHA workers' strike had been terrible, reports Shyam G Menon.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah on Friday distanced himself from the WikiLeaks cable emanating from the United States embassy in Delhi relating to alleged human rights violations in Kashmir in 2005 and indirectly blamed the then government led by opposition Peoples Democratic Party.
With 19 border polling stations along the Line of Control in Rajouri and Poonch, a contingency plan has been worked out to deal with cross-border shelling though chances are negligible given the ongoing ceasefire between India and Pakistan that came into effect in February 2021, officials said.
The PMK has now lent its voice to the protests against the mining of atomic minerals in Kanyakumari.
Leader of Opposition VD Satheesan on Sunday said the UDF will take part in all the rehabilitation efforts and work towards restoring normalcy in the lives of the survivors.
Umar Sulaiman Sheikh, 22 had been among the injured after security forces fired live ammunition to quell a protest in the village on September 16. The youth had been under treatment in the institute where doctors tried to revive him.
For trust in democracy to be retained, elections need to be not just free of intervention -- ruling out Pakistan and Russia -- but also demonstrate the capability to both deliver ruling mandates and hold the potential for large swings in favour of the opposition, points out Mihir S Sharma.And, after an election is done, they need to see a mandate in order to go back to their lives and let their representatives get on with the business of government, points out Mihir S Sharma.
The Haryana victory will be a morale booster for the Bharatiya Janata Party and increase its bargaining power in the Mahayuti's seat-sharing talks for the upcoming Maharashtra assembly elections, according to political analysts.
The opposition Republican Party plunged into a crisis as its Speaker Kevin McCarthy lost the gavel after a small group of its Congressmen joined hands with the Democratic Party in an unprecedented vote in the House of Representatives.
If as critics point out, the environmental impact assessment study was commissioned only after the auction process got underway with not all the stakeholders getting to know of it, then the government has already compromised the trust it could have enjoyed with Kerala's public including its coastal communities, points out Shyam G Menon.
Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi along with the five other Congress MPs from Uttar Pradesh will visit violence-hit Sambhal on Wednesday, party's state unit chief Ajay Rai said.
Even as the ruling National Conference felt the time was not "appropriate" for holding polls in Jammu and Kashmir because of September's devastating floods, its coalition partner Congress and opposition parties in the state welcomed the Election Commission's announcement of conducting assembly elections on time.
Gandhi was seen sitting behind a few rows of seats, which were occupied by members of the Indian contingent that took part in the recently-held Paris Games.
In the months immediately following the 2024 tragedy, reporting on the landslide per se had been a straightforward affair. On one side was death and destruction. On the other side, survivors and the business of survival. It was black and white. What direction to take was clear. Rehabilitation in comparison, felt like a complex situation. One that is fraught with shades of grey. As grey as human life, explains Shyam G Menon.
Our political history tells us this has never worked. A united Opposition does work in some specific, limited situations, especially in the states. But never as some brilliant pan-national collection of diverse interests with no ideological or political core, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
'Everyone is unhappy with the lieutenant governor's administration, which is ignorant, high-handed, and inaccessible.'
An impressive performance in Jharkhand and, especially, Maharashtra assembly polls next month by the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance will lay to rest the doubts over the party's political dominance after its underwhelming performance in the Lok Sabha polls and strike a body blow to the Opposition.
The Delhi high court on Friday sought a response from the Centre, Election Commission of India, and 26 political parties on a petition seeking to restrain opposition parties from using the acronym INDIA for their alliance.
The Opposition Congress alleged that the blast, which occurred around 1 am according to the police, happened during the manufacturing of country-made bombs by some CPI-M supporters.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday snubbed the Rashtriya Janata Dal, headed by his arch-rival Lalu Prasad Yadav, stating that he had forged alliances 'by mistake' with the opposition party which 'did nothing' while in power.
Modi said Vajpayee would remain an inspiration and said the outpouring of emotions following his death despite his being away from public life for over a decade due to illness, shows his greatness.
The Jammu and Kashmir assembly on Friday passed a bill banning inter-district recruitment in the state.
Ruling parties held sway in most of the 13 states in the assembly byelection results declared on Saturday, with the Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies wresting seats in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan and the Trinamool Congress sweeping West Bengal.
Referencing to a decline in manufacturing in democratic countries such as India and the US in recent years as production shifted to China, Gandhi said the shift had produced mass inequality and anger which needed urgent attention and dialogue.
Every trick in the trade is being tried unabashedly.
In simple arithmetical terms every possible 'arrangement' is being made to deny a majority to its rivals. A split verdict would hand a vital advantage to the BJP which is adept at extracting the best out of such a situation, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the distinguished commentator on Kashmir affairs.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances