Besides Defence Minister Singh (Lucknow), Minister of Women and Child Development Irani (Amethi), those in the fray are Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Kaushal Kishor (Mohanlalganj) and Minister of State of Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur).
It was a day of mayhem for the main opposition party as S M Qamar Alam, a national general secretary of the RJD, walked to the chamber of Vidhan Parishad Acting chairman Awadhesh Narain Singh along with four others to tender their resignation. The other MLCs who resigned are Sanjay Prasad, Radha Charan Seth, Ranvijay Kumar Singh and Dlip Rai.
Prasad was approached with queries by journalists at the airport, where he had reached, alongside son and Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav, to board a flight to Delhi for the coalition meeting on Tuesday.
The Tamil Nadu assembly on Friday once again passed a unanimous resolution urging the Centre to exempt the state from National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test and allow it to admit students to medical courses based on Plus Two exam marks.
The BJP has named sitting MP Rajiv Pratap Rudy as its nominee on the politically important seat.
Yadav, who is now leading his party as its chief ministerial candidate for the assembly polls due in a few months, made the charm offensive at a party function.
The governor accepted Kumar's resignation, and asked him to continue as caretaker CM till a new government is formed, they said.
'Tej Pratap doesn't have votes on his own. But should he want, he can always rock the RJD's boat because of his antics.'
'The Congress should have played a more active role to take care of the needs of regional parties. It failed.' 'Taking this into account, Nitishji took the final decision with the full support of the JD-U.'
While Prasad has been asked to depose on January 29, Tejashwi has been called the next day on January 30.
Virtually addressing party workers and voters of 11 assembly constituencies that will go to vote in the first phase on October 28, Kumar highlighted the achievements of his governments during his three terms as CM since 2005, and compared those with the work done during the 15-year rule before that.
Gourav Vallabh joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday hours after he quit the Congress, saying he can neither raise anti-Sanatan slogans nor abuse "wealth creators" day in and day out and was joining the ruling party due to his support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's agenda of "Viksit Bharat".
Sources in both the BJP and the Janata Dal-United suggested such a possibility but it remained unclear if Kumar, the unquestioned leader of his party, has finalised a deal with the BJP top brass.
The charge sheet has been filed before a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court in Delhi and the court has listed the matter to be heard on January 16, the sources said.
The ruling coalition won 125 seats in the 243-member state assembly against 110 clinched by the opposition Grand Alliance to pave the way for a fourth successive term for Kumar in office.
The meeting, proposed at the CM House, has been called to discuss strategy over the current political situation and the Enforcement Directorate's proposed questioning of Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Wednesday, he said.
Hours before Union Home Minister Amit Shah's virtual rally in Bihar on Sunday, Rashtriya Janata Dal leaders and workers staged protests, beating utensils and blowing conch shells against what their leader Tejashwi Yadav dubbed as the ruling party's celebration of the devastation caused by COVID-19 and the lockdown.
"This is not a manifesto, it is our pledge to bring a change which is set to become true. Every sector has been taken into consideration while preparing this manifesto so that we can make Bihar a happy, better and prosperous state," Tejashwi Yadav said while releasing vision document.
With the reality of coalition politics staring the BJP in its face, this was inevitable, points out Ramesh Menon.
'What social justice is Tejashwi talking about?' 'Muslims in Bihar are asking we are 18%, and you are giving us 2 seats.'
'His way of communication is different than the first yatra.' 'Maybe his anger and frustration stems from the fact that no one is asking hard questions to the government and he is trying to do that.'
Three different invitations were sent out for the wedding and the receptions with top-run guests being sent a large red box that contained an intricate chest incorporating a mini silver temple featuring gold idols of various Hindu deities, including Lord Ganesh, Radha-Krishna, and Goddess Durga.
The Bihar Police's Economic Offences Unit, which is probing the alleged National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate) (NEET-UG) paper leak case, on Saturday claimed to have obtained reference question papers of the test conducted by National Testing Agency (NTA) and planned to compare these with documents recovered from a flat in Patna during a search operation last month.
For renomination to the Rajya Sabha, Nadda will have to look for a seat outside his home state of Himachal Pradesh as the Congress is in power there.
Terming the Congress a "shackle" for the alliance, Rashtriya Janata Dal Shivanand Tiwari said the party had contested on 70 seats but did not hold as many rallies.
Upset about being snubbed by INDIA, Nitish Kumar is weighing his political options. BJP would like him back knowing that it would jolt the Opposition alliance, perhaps irreversibly.
'When he was sidelined in the INDIA bloc, it was was the turning point because it badly hurt Nitish's ambition.' 'After that, he decided to damage INDIA by changing sides.'
The Janata Dal-United leader maintained that having taken the initiative to bring parties opposed to the Bharatiya Janata Party, he desired nothing for himself but admitted having stressed at the meeting the need to expedite seat-sharing arrangements.
If everything goes according to the plan, the exercise will begin after the Lok Sabha elections, the official said.
Chirag Paswan cryptically added that he was not ruling out the possibility of siding with the RJD.
The Opposition INDIA bloc on Friday finalised a 14-member coordination-cum-election strategy committee comprising members of various parties, and it will function as the alliance's highest decision-making body and start work on seat-sharing immediately, sources said.
Kushwaha was absent at a get-together of the NDA in Patna on Thursday night and his party demanded that the next Lok Sabha and assembly polls be fought under his leadership.
Former Union minister Pashupati Kumar Paras, who quit after his Lok Janshakti Party faction was not given any seat by the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance in Bihar for the Lok Sabha elections, on Saturday announced his party's support to the ruling alliance, ending speculation over his next course of action.
The Yatra comes a day after the Congress was left high and dry with former ally Nitish Kumar, the Bihar chief minister, making a return to the BJP-led NDA.
Megha Engineering and Infrastructures Limited was the top donor to the Bharatiya Janata Party at Rs 584 crore and the Bharat Rashtra Samiti at Rs 195 crore.
The TMC chief, however, parried questions on her reservations about the Congress's alliance with the Left in her state and the Aam Aadmi Party threatening a "walkout" if support was not forthcoming on the ordinance of control of services in Delhi.
Other prominent candidates among the 904 in the fray are Union minister Anurag Thakur, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee, RJD supremo Lalu Prasad's daughter Misa Bharti.
BJP heavyweights Smriti Irani, Arjun Munda, Ajay Mishra Teni and Kailash Chaudhary were among the 13 Union ministers who tasted defeat in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, as stunning losses in three Hindi heartland states forced the BJP to rely on allies to form the government.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among the 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday while Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27.
The BJP leads with 23 percent of its 90 Rajya Sabha members having declared criminal cases against themselves.
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