Punjab Bharatiya Janata Party leaders met the governor in Chandigarh on Thursday, demanding the dismissal of the state's home minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and the police chief over the security breach during the prime minister's visit to Punjab.
As leaders in both the BJP and Congress concede, neither has within their parties a leader to match Arvind Kejriwal's charisma in Delhi.
His remarks came a day after AAP Punjab unit chief Bhagwant Mann took a dig at the cricketer-turned-politician and asked him to tweet about the 'funds' allegedly accepted by the ruling Congress from private power companies in the state.
He said, Kejriwal was dreaming of becoming the CM of every state he visits.
The electoral exercise, the first since the Lok Sabha elections, will decide the fate of many veterans and some debutantes including Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu's wife Kamlesh Thakur.
Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu has been at loggerheads with the chief minister, attacking him on issues like the alleged delay in the completion of a probe into the 2015 desecration of Sikh texts and the subsequent police firing on protesters.
In a video message posted on X, Kangana Ranaut claimed that she and the members of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) have been receiving threats. She said she is under pressure to not show the assassination of the former prime minster by her security guards.
The Opposition on Monday targeted Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, alleging that he was deplaned from a Delhi-bound flight at the Frankfurt airport as he was 'drunk', a charge denied by the ruling AAP as baseless.
Shiromani Akali Dal-Amritsar's Simranjit Singh Mann on Sunday won the Sangrur Lok Sabha seat after defeating his nearest rival, Aam Aadmi Party's Gurmail Singh, by a margin of 5,822 votes.
Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann on Thursday said the session of the state assembly will be summoned on September 27.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and all 117 party candidates in Punjab will pay obeisance at the Golden Temple and sit down for a langar on Thursday.
Congress MLA Mamman Khan has been named an accused in an FIR lodged after the August 31 Nuh violence, the Haryana government told the high court on Thursday, also claiming that the police have the phone call records and other evidence to back the move.
It is wrong to say the Congress doesn't matter. Certainly one set of people who do not believe that for a minute is the BJP. That's why even in his speech in Parliament on Constitution Day, Mr Modi called dynastic politics a threat to democracy, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Replying to a question, she said people voted for him with expectations that he would work for their welfare.
Scores of Punjab farmers protesting against the government over various issues, including a bonus on wheat and beginning paddy sowing from June 10, spent the night on the road after they were stopped from marching towards Chandigarh.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal mounted a blazing campaign in the hot summer after he was released from the Tihar jail on interim bail on May 10, drawing huge crowds at rallies and roadshows, but it proved insufficient to propel his Aam Aadmi Party past the Bharartiya Janata Party challenge in the national capital.
Punjab Congress president Amarinder Singh said Sidhu is welcome to the Congress if he wants.
Nitin Desai, who has known Dr Singh from 1971, extends his 'deepest condolences to his wife Gurcharan Kaur and to his three talented daughters Upinder, the historian; Daman, the writer; and Amrit, the human rights activist.'
The additional director general of police (security), however, said in an order on Friday that the security personnel were 'being withdrawn on a purely temporary basis in connection with an emergent law and order duty'.
The assembly polls are seen as a test of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity, especially in the wake of demonetisation.
Speaking to the media persons in Delhi on Sunday, the Rajya Sabha member said: "I have declined the offer to be the next Punjab CM. I believe Punjab CM face should be a Sikh."
Any decision taken by Congress president Sonia Gandhi will be acceptable to all, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said on Saturday as talk of Navjot Singh Sidhu being appointed chief of the party's state unit despite his oft-stated reservations gathered force.
Sunita Kejriwal and daughter Harshita Kejriwal will seek votes for chief ministerial candidate Bhagwant Mann in the Dhuri assembly seat.
Radical Sikh preacher Amritpal Singh has distanced himself from his mother's statement in which she had said that her son was not a Khalistani supporter, according to a statement issued by the Khadoor Sahib MP.
Sidhu made the sharp retort amid speculation that the former cricketer is himself eyeing the top post if the Congress wins next month's assembly polls.
Nothing exemplifies this Sikh khundak (revenge) better than the fact that all the tallest names in the state lost their election to novices fielded by AAP.
The 48-year-old Mann was elected the AAP Legislature Party leader at a meeting of the party MLAs in Mohali on Friday.
The Opposition targeted Mann on Monday, alleging that he was deplaned from a Delhi-bound aircraft at the Frankfurt airport as he was drunk, a charge dismissed by the ruling Aam Aadmi Party as baseless.
The Punjab BJP dubbed the allegations as "baseless" and "bundle of lies" and said AAP is trying to divert attention of people from its "failures".
Glimpses from the campaign trail on Thursday, February 17, 2022.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's unexpected announcement on Sunday that he will resign after two days drew mixed reactions from parties, with some saying it was a compulsion due to bail restrictions on his functioning and others hailing it as a right call to go back to the people.
The TMC also announced it would hold talks with other regional parties in their bid to take on the BJP in the crucial 2024 elections but at the same time denied that it was planning a third front, separate from the Congress-led front.
Every time we look at the Congress, its future, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, we find the situation more hopeless than even a few months earlier, observes Shekhar Gupta.
It was only last month that Ranaut faced backlash for advocating the return of the three farm laws repealed in 2021.
Shiromani Akali Dal patriarch Parkash Singh Badal (94) became the country's oldest candidate to fight elections as he filed his nomination papers from Lambi on Monday.
The Sikhs, especially in Punjab, are already angry and frustrated, cautions Shekhar Gupta.
Polling was held for over hundred civic bodies in Punjab on Sunday amid stray incidents of skirmishes at some places.
Consolidating its position, the Bharatiya Janata Party wrested high-profile Rampur and Azamgarh Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh from the Samajwadi Party and won three assembly seats, including that of Chief Minister Manik Saha, in Tripura in by-election results announced on Sunday.
As state-level leaders tried to placate Sidhu, he made it clear through the video that he was in no mood to budge on his 'principles'.
Sources said all the ministers expressed anguish over the "major security breach" during Modi's visit to the Congress-ruled state on Wednesday, with some demanding strong action.
