The Congress may stand a better chance in the assembly polls if it followed the 'Himachal model', suggests N Sathiya Moorthy.
The committee, of which Mukul Wasnik is the convener and has former chief ministers Ashok Gehlot and Bhupesh Baghel as well as Mohan Prakash and Salman Khurshid in it, held final talks and suggested the way forward to the party leadership.
Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Manoj Sonkar on Tuesday defeated Aam Aadmi Party's Kuldeep Kumar to win the post of mayor in the Chandigarh mayoral polls.
Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar's remarks on Pakistan sparked a political row on Friday, with his party quick to dissociate itself from the comments while the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party latched on to them, accusing the Congress of being an apologist for Pakistan and the terrorism emanating from its soil.
The CISF, tasked with providing security at airports, has also ordered a court of inquiry into the incident.
The scion of erstwhile Patiala Royal family refused to comment on the number of ministers who will be part of the new cabinet.
Sources within the Congress, including those who have been members of the teams that drafted its 2019 and 2024 Lok Sabha poll manifestos, said the Karnataka government decision lacked any empirical basis.
The prospect of the Delhi chief minister's wife, Sunita Kejriwal, who has so far maintained a distance from politics, assuming a new role is also being discussed by people.
Sidhu, who had been at loggerheads with Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, had stayed away from all Congress activities ever since he resigned as cabinet minister last year.
Names of Rajya Sabha MPs Harbhajan Singh and Swati Maliwal are missing from the list.
The Congress on Friday claimed that a 'silent undercurrent' is brewing across western Uttar Pradesh against the 'failures' of the Modi government, as it flagged issues such as 'neglect' of sugarcane farmers and examination paper leaks.
In his absence, the party stares at uncertainty as many of its other senior leaders are either in jail or in political obscurity.
Janata Dal-United parliamentary board chief Upendra Kushwaha said that violence was 'deplorable' but hastened to add 'Besides making an appeal for peace, we can do little'.
Now, every state election -- first up, Maharashtra, Haryana and Jharkhand later this year, then Delhi in January and Bihar in September next year -- will be seen by his followers for evidence of his recovery, and by rivals of sharpening decline, points out Shekhar Gupta.
The Mayawati-led BSP will fight 20 of the 117 assembly seats in Punjab, while the rest will be contested by the SAD.
A day after his release on interim bail, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal launched a blistering attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, alleging he was on a 'One nation, One leader' mission to impose 'dictatorship' by putting all leaders from opposition behind bars and 'politically finishing off' those in the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Reacting sharply to Banerjee's fulminations, the Congress struck back pointing out that Prime Minster Narendra Modi's and her stand were similar, with one seeking a 'Congress 'Mukt' (Free) India' and the other, an 'Opposition coalition sans Congress'.
Polling will be held in all 13 seats in Punjab and an equal number of seats in Uttar Pradesh, nine in West Bengal, eight seats each in Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, four in Himachal Pradesh, three in Jharkhand and the lone seat Chandigarh.
The new Lok Sabha will have 300 MPs who have been elected for the first time to the Lower House.
Former MP Dr Ajoy Kumar on Monday offered to resign from the post of president of Jharkhand Pradesh Congress Committee and Punjab Congress chief Sunil Jakhar quit their posts.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday vowed to thwart alleged attempts to rob Dalits and backward classes of reservations by the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) which he accused of 'enslavement' and performing 'mujra' for Muslim vote bank.
'The honourable prime minister virtually handpicked me for the Amritsar East seat.' 'Amit Shahji announced that if I am elected, the whole of Punjab will be drugs free.'
Taking potshots at the Bharatiya Janata Party, some opposition leaders also wondered if Goel resigned to contest the Lok Sabha polls on its ticket like former Calcutta high court judge Abhijit Gangopadhyay.
He further said Sidhu's resignation has been forwarded to Punjab Governor V P Singh Badnore.
Raising slogans of 'Inquilab Zindabad' and 'Kejriwal Zindabad', Aam Aadmi Party workers and leaders reached the area's metro station in groups, with the party calling for a march to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's residence on Lok Kalyan Marg for a 'gherao'.
Long queues were seen at outpatient department ticket counters in government hospitals, where senior doctors joined their junior colleagues in the protest.
The Akali Dal-BJP alliance won on four seats and the AAP bagged one.
At its Jaipur meeting, the BJP will focus on this year's assembly elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh while the Congress's Chintan Shivir in Udaipur will discuss how it can resurrect itself.
The National Conference is a part of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) and will continue to be, party leader Omar Abdullah clarified on Thursday and said it is in talks with the Congress for an arrangement in three of the six Lok Sabha seats in Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.
The AAP will contest all the 90 assembly seats in Haryana on its own, but the Lok Sabha polls will be fought as part of the INDIA bloc, Kejriwal said.
The Congress has consciously contested on a lesser number of seats in this Lok Sabha election as part of a strategy to keep the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) together and defeat the Bharatiya Janata Party, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge has said.
Modi, in his rally just days ahead of the last phase of the Lok Sabha election, also said that "well-wishers of Naveen babu are worried over his deteriorating health condition."
The outgoing Lok Sabha had 23 Muslim MPs, the most being from Congress and TMC. The highest number of Muslim MPs were in 1980 when as many as 49 MPs from the community which constitute nearly fifth of Indian population present in the Lok Sabha.
Political parties were bracing for the assembly election results on Thursday in the crucial state of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and politically volatile Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur, sending out feelers for possible post-poll tie-ups.
'Go around and ask what Amritpal has done for the village and nearby areas.'
Addressing reporters at his residence soon after the meeting ended, Chowdhury said six names came up before the panel for the selection of the two ECs and the names of Sandhu and Kumar were finalised by a majority of members of the high-powered panel.
Besides the national capital, polling for the sixth round of the marathon seven-phase elections will be held Saturday in 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, all 10 seats of Haryana, eight seats each in Bihar and West Bengal, six seats in Odisha, four seats in Jharkhand and one seat in Jammu and Kashmir.
The BJP's top leadership will drop its MPs found to be facing anti-incumbency, according to its internal surveys -- a pivotal tactic to ensure the party achieves its target of winning 370 seats.
The MPs criticised the Shiromani Akali Dal leadership for being in the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA even after these bills were proposed by the government.
The assembly polls are seen as a test of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's popularity, especially in the wake of demonetisation.
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