Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party chief Om Prakash Rajbhar, Rashtriya Lok Dal's Anil Kumar and two Bharatiya Janata Party leaders were sworn in on Tuesday as Yogi Adityanath expanded his council of ministers, weeks ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.
Pilot had claimed that the Ashok Gehlot government was in minority and more than 30 Congress and some independent legislators have pledged support to him.
Referring to the polling for the first phase of elections, Yogi said that the time for a "big decision" has come.
The 14-member party has withdrawn support to the coalition government, which has been surviving on a simple majority.
They joined their nine colleagues, already in Srinagar, to foil any bid by the BSP-BJP coalition to break their party.\n\n
However, the BJP is sceptical about the SP-BSP alliance as they believe Mayawati and Akhilesh will "finish off after fighting among themselves."
The meeting came a day after Rashtriya Lok Dal president Ajit Singh met the Congress chief for a tie-up in Uttar Pradesh.
Opposition parties feel the need for a vote of confidence in the wake of Ajit Singh-led Rashtriya Loktantrik Dal's decision to withdraw its ministers.
Despite Babbar being the local parliamentarian, he has failed to set Yamuna on fire and leaders from Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party as also the Baharatiya Janata Party dubbed the party of the suspended SP leader as an 'also-ran.'
This will be the first time the BJP has got more seats than Chief Minister Nitish Kumar-led JD-U in Bihar, underscoring the change in their equations after they joined hands a few months back.
Misa Bharti's election office in a khatal is meant to symbolise an emotional connect with her parents Lalu Yadav and Rabri Devi's caste, the Yadavs, who are considered traditional RJD voters.
Only in the event of the RSS managing to force Modi into accepting a consensual candidate, will the party not continue to 'being' the 'next Congress', observes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Congress on Tuesday said it planned to go it alone in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls and would consider tie-ups only on its "own conditions and interests", a development that could queer the pitch for parties like Ajit Singh-led Rashtriya Lok Dal.
Leaders of several INDIA bloc parties met the Election Commission over the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Bihar and raised concerns over its timing, alleging that over two crore voters of the state may be disenfranchised by this mammoth exercise being done just ahead of assembly elections.
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.
Chaudhary also announced that if his party is voted into power in Uttar Pradesh, high court benches will be set up in western Uttar Pradesh, Bundelkhand and Purvanchal areas of the state.
The meeting of opposition parties has been called by Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United leader Nitish Kumar to chalk out a joint strategy to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Five ministerial berths, including two of Cabinet rank, have fallen vacant after the Ajit Singh-led RLD withdrew support to the Mayawati-led BJP-BSP coalition in Lucknow.
Development economist Jean Dreze said the Indian democracy is currently navigating a crisis that is not only limited to the 'recent wave of authoritarianism' but also suppression of opposition voices by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
'We used to discuss how image-conscious Nitish Kumar was and his sophisticated conduct in public life. All this has become a thing of the past.'
The delegations led by Baijayant Panda, Ravi Shankar Prasad (both Bharatiya Janata Party), Sanjay Kumar Jha (Janata Dal-United), Shrikant Shinde (Shiv Sena), Shashi Tharoor (Congress), Kanimozhi (Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam) and Supriya Sule (Nationalist Congress Party-Sharad Pawar) will visit a total of 32 countries and the EU headquarters in Brussels, Belgium.
Leaders from 26 opposition parties, in power individually or in alliance in Delhi and 10 states, are meeting in Bengaluru to discuss strategy to take on the Narendra Modi-led NDA in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Nishant Kumar's demand that the NDA name Nitish Kumar as its chief ministerial nominee is seen as a gambit to consolidate the CM's position in the ruling alliance.
Majority of these constituencies are in Uttar Pradesh and the party that is on the third slot even as the counting is still underway on several seats is the Bahujan Samaj Party, a party neither with the National Democratic Alliance nor the opposition INDIA bloc.
The plea was filed by several opposition leaders seeking counting of voter verifiable paper audit trail slips of 50 per cent of electronic voting machines in each constituency before the Lok Sabha results are declared.
There is a proposal from the BJP camp that they would resort to a proportion-based increase in the number of Lok Sabha seats for individual states, based on what they now have. On the face of it, this sounds like a fine argument that those demanding a 'freeze' now cannot oppose without reasons and justification, avers N Sathiya Moorthy.
The total income of national and regional parties from unknown sources for 2020-21 stands at Rs 690.67 crore.
Nitish Kumar wants to assure the BJP leadership that he will continue to be a part of the NDA. But he also wants to secure a larger number of seats for his party in the 2025 assembly elections in Bihar.
The Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party on Wednesday termed the list of candidates released by its alliance partner Samajwadi Party for the Uttar Pradesh legislative council elections as "disappointing".
The Samajwadi Party released its list of 40 star campaigners in which there was no mention of Mulayam Singh Yadav.
'Prashant Kishor is a businessman before he is a politician, and given that the expected average turnout for JSP candidates is 5,000 to 6,000 votes and since Bihar has a significant number of seats where the margin between the winner and runner-up falls within that range he will capitalise on exactly that to showcase his presence.'
"The turnout in the four Lok Sabha seats was low as compared to the 2019 polls but on the basis of feedback received from these constituencies, we are confident of winning these. People are fed up with false promises made by BJP leaders," he said.
Former Lok Janshakti Party president Chirag Paswan on Sunday asserted that every party wants him to be on its side, indicating he could tilt towards the one that offered a better bargain.
What some of our leaders were up to on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Manjhi's son Santosh Suman, who is a minister in the Nitish Kumar cabinet, made the statement a day after reports emerged that a seat-sharing formula has been arrived at in the National Democratic Alliance, and the HAM was likely to get only one of the state's 40 constituencies.
BJP sources said a meeting of the National Democratic Alliance is expected to take place soon to highlight its growing strength and to dispel the impression that the departure of some of its oldest allies such as the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena, Shiromani Akali Dal and the Janata Dal-United have the left the saffron party without a major partner.
Scindia also said that as far as talks for alliances are concerned, "like-minded parties should also think in a like-minded way".
