The poll results will depend much on whether the caste and community coalition worked out by Akhilesh can withstand the onslaught of the Hindutva forces who have increased their efforts to polarise the electorate on communal lines.
As per practice, counting of votes will take place on November 9 evening after polling concludes.
Additional SP Ram Kishan Yadav said a large crowd had gathered outside the public works department guest house where the CM was holding the programme.
The Samajwadi Party on Thursday pulled out of the 'grand alliance' in poll-bound Bihar, saying it felt "humiliated" as it was not consulted while deciding seats and would contest the assembly elections in the state on its own.
While people voted in a fifth round that will set the tone as this election rounds into the straight, and while Modi on the stump chews the cud of personal grievances and hackneyed promises that have long since passed their use-by date, there is a rogue wave rising -- what damage it will do, we will know 16 days from today, observes Prem Panicker.
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.
Opposition parties on Sunday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party after Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar and eight others were inducted into the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government, saying the ruling party's 'washing machine' has resumed its operation to clean tainted leaders and it was an 'ED-facilitated power grab'.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will present the Interim Budget on February 1 ahead of the Lok Sabha elections likely to be held in April-May.
Biju Janata Dal supremo and Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who was the first to advocate an alternative government minus Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party at the Centre, on Tuesday said it was still too early for such a move.
In contrast to the inertia in the SP camp, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party showed no complacency in the run-up to the polls this month.
'We have got together to save the democracy, Constitution and brotherhood. The country's constitutional institutions are being misused and the country's wealth is being sold out'
An independent Muslim candidate has secured a surprise victory in a ward in the Hindutva nerve centre of Ayodhya in the civic election results declared on Saturday.
The meeting between the two leaders, which was also attended by Bihar's deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, was described as 'positive'.
For the BJP, the RSS' organisational heft is a prized asset, considering the slew of elections it faces this year, ahead of the Lok Sabha election in 2024.
She released the party's manifesto "Unnati Vidhan", which she termed as "Jan Ghoshna Patra'.
In UP and Bengal, it is willing to sacrifice its interests to stop the BJP and would work towards ensuring the BJP did not win incremental seats in Odisha and Telangana.
Under Election Commission guidelines, campaigning has to end 48 hours before the close of polls for each phase.
Samajwadi Party, which has decided not to enter the fray in Amethi and Rae Bareli, on Tuesday disapproved the Bharatiya Janata Party fielding "outsiders" from the Nehru-Gandhi pocket borough, saying such a practice was against democracy.
A visibly perturbed Dhankhar termed O'Brien's behaviour "theatrics" that would not be tolerated.
Azad said electoral laws make it clear that the ruling party should have no advantage during elections and both the Opposition and the ruling side should be on an equal footing.
Sources said the opposition parties would look to avoid the prickly leadership question as of now and emphasise on building a common ground.
UP Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said the BJP parliamentary board and its national leadership will decide under whom the upcoming state assembly elections will be fought.
Yadav denied any possibility for a post-poll alliance between the BJP and the Rashtriya Lok Dal's Jayant Choudhary.
Harping on putting up a united front, the Congress alleged that democracy is being "mercilessly murdered" and MPs who raise people's issues are suspended from the House.
Gangster-politician Mukhtar Ansari's alleged aide Sanjeev Maheshwari Jeeva was shot dead on Lucknow court premises on Wednesday, the police said.
Voting began on Thursday in the by-election to seven assembly constituencies in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
However, speculation remained rife that the meeting was part of Banerjee's plan to form an opposition front with regional players minus the Congress.
Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and his chief minister son Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday jointly sounded the party's bugle for 2014 Lok Sabha elections from this eastern Uttar Pradesh hub, ill-famed as a home and haven for several terrorists.
Dinesh Pratap Singh, who was elected to the state legislative council for the second time in 2016 and left the Congress last year, is pitted against UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi on a seat held by her since 2004.
The colourful rally galvanised the BRS workers who shouted slogans hailing the party-led regime's welfare schemes in Telangana and peppy political songs praised Rao's 'national' emergence.
Spread over 10 districts, polling in these constituencies will be held from 7 am till 6 pm on Thursday.
Lakhimpur Kheri had been one of the key attack points of the Opposition parties such as the Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and Congress against the BJP in the run up to the polls.
Rajya Sabha on Tuesday passed a bill to regulate the appointment and service terms of Chief Election Commissioner and election commissioners incorporating key amendments like retaining their status at par with Supreme Court judges, upgrading the search committee and inserting a new clause to protect them from court cases while discharging their official duties.
The study showed the ruling BJP has 132 crorepati MLAs, followed by 14 of the Congress, all three Independents, and one each of the Aam Aadmi Party and the Samajwadi Party.
Although it saw a veritable who's who of the Oppostion leadership, the Samajwadi Party stayed away from the Iftar dinner hosted by Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Monday.
Scenes from the Opposition leaders' dinner meeting, in Bengaluru on Monday, July 17, 2023.
Two men were killed when a "speeding" car linked to a Bharatiya Janata Party legislator hit their motorcycle in a head-on collision in Lakhimpur Kheri, the police said on Monday.
Glimpses from all the action from the campaign trail.
Gandhi, then a newly appointed Congress chief, had staked claim to form the government at the Centre after the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee had lost the vote of confidence in the Lok Sabha on April 17, 1999.
A 'preliminary enquiry' has been launched into the 'disappearance' of Uttar Pradesh minister Rakesh Sachan from a courtroom in Kanpur 'without furnishing bail bonds' after being convicted in an Arms Act case, a senior police official said Sunday.
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