'The voters of Jharkhand did not accept Raghubar Das.'
At a time when finding out who is paying for labourers' train tickets is a task for Sherlock Holmes, Hemant Soren's Jharkhand government has flown in stranded workers from Ladakh, and is probably the only state that has tried to give 'migrant workers' a modicum of respect, observes Debashish Chatterjee.
RJD chief Lalu Prasad and other leaders claimed the countdown for the ouster of the BJP and its allies from power in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls had begun.
"All opposition parties should work together. It should be a one-to-one fight against the BJP. All opposition parties should help the strongest one in the state against the BJP," Banerjee said.
The meeting saw archrivals TMC and CPI-M coming together on a common platform against the government.
Slamming as "fascist" Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi's pitch for a "Congress Mukt Bharat", Congress leader Digvijay Singh on Monday reached out to all non-BJP parties on the plank of secularism.
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 central learning of the day was that if the BJP leadership can cajole, coax and convince regional parties to vote for bills, it would not be a stretch to see the same votes cast in favour of the land bill,' a senior Congress leader from a northern state told Rediff.com
This is the first meeting chaired by Gandhi after relinquishing the post of Congress president last year.
'The people of Jharkhand know that Modi is not going to become chief minister, so why should they vote for the BJP?'
The opposition parties snatched the high-profile Kairana LS seat in from BJP with a united force.
'Rahul Gandhi was given the impression that if the seat was given to me, then the alliance would be broken in all 40 seats.'
The Uttar Pradesh by-election will be the real test for the Modi government. By-election results are not a referendum on Modi but the time has come to analyse whether the Modi government is succeeding in assuring people that the promises it made would be fulfilled, says Dharmendra Kumar Singh.
Allegations of electronic voting machines malfunctioningreturned to haunt the Election Commission as four Lok Sabha seats and nine assembly constituencies went for bypolls on Monday across 10 states with moderate-to-heavy voting amid prestige at stake for the Bharatiya Janata Party as well as opposition parties ahead of the 2019 general elections.
'This is what Hindu Rashtra looks like, which has been enabled by conditions of democracy.'
Unfazed by the absence of leaders of the Left, the Janata Dal-United, the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee along with some regional parties on Tuesday sought to put up a united face raising the pitch against demonetisation by demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
After the 18-member 'Assam Advisory Committee' suggested the two organisations to form a political party, a source close to the development said the new outfit will be launched within the next 10 days.
'He is anything but astute or charismatic. He believes the Congress can win elections without alliances in the Hindi heartland.'
'Anti-incumbency, especially in Maharashtra; the BJP's success in creating a new social coalition; and the sheer force of the party's campaign which overwhelmed its opponents,' argues Praful Bidwai, brought the BJP victory in Haryana and Maharashtra, not the Modi effect.
As Prime Minister Narendra Modi defended the demonetisation move, the united opposition hit back at the government over common man's suffering.
'He depended too much on assurances given by sadhus and sants. He may not be culpable, but he was wholly responsible for December 6, 1992.' 'While Manmohan Singh came to reforms out of conviction, Rao came to reforms out of compulsion. If the compulsion had not been there, I don't know how he would have responded.'
