The Congress on Monday dismissed Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav's view that coalition politics has come to stay in the country, saying he has not said "something new" and the party is not "bothered."
Ending months of speculation, expelled Samajwadi Party leader leaders Amar Singh and Jaya Prada joined the Ajit Singh-led Rashtriya Lok Dal on Monday ahead of Lok Sabha polls.
The Congress is working on "evolving a general consensus" for naming the candidate for the next president of India with sources in the party confirming that Pranab Mukherjee appears to be the only name doing the rounds.
Rahul Gandhi is more inclined towards Akhilesh, who has said their combination could win more than 300 of the 403 assembly seats.
In renaming TRS and repositioning it as a 'national' party, KCR is also eyeing a pole position in opposition politics ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Having a dig at Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav's pledge of reservation to Muslims in the party's manifesto, Congress today said his party does not have the numerical strength in Parliament to deliver on the promise by amending the Constitution.
The war of words between the Congress and the Samajwadi Party intensified on Tuesday, with SP General Secretary Amar Singh saying All India Congress Committee General Secretary Digvijay Singh should be held responsible, if the alliance between the two parties breaks.Singh stated that his party helped the Congress at 'times of difficulty' and instead of being thankful, their party leaders were giving irresponsible statements.
Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker M Thambidurai appealed to the newly appointed party general secretary V K Sasikala to become Tamil Nadu chief minister, saying the leadership in both the party and governance should be with the same person.
BJP's central leadership has thrown its weight behind Yogi Adityanath, putting a stop to murmurs against the state government months ahead of the assembly polls.
He also claimed that corrupt persons and officials had joined hands with the government during the previous regime when Akhilesh was the chief minister and the same thing was happening in the present dispensation.
The Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party saved Dr Manmohan Singh's chair today; will they tug it away from under him tomorrow, asks T V R Shenoy.
While Brijlal Khabri, former BSP MP from Jalaun, is UP Congress Committee chairman, former UP cabinet minister and Mayawati's once close confidant Naseemuddin Siddiqui heads the party's state media department. Completing the ex-BSP troika, Nakul Dubey, former UP cabinet minister in the Mayawati dispensation (2007-12), is one of the six UP Congress regional presidents. He is reckoned among the most active of the three.
"No government can be formed without Congress, which is a major and deeply-rooted party in the country. Congress is the main opposition party too. Others are regional parties," Raut said in Pune
Samajwadi Party leader Tej Narayan Pandey on Sunday accused Shri Ram Janmbhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust of committing corruption in a land deal and sought a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into the matter.
'To summarise, PM Modi's failures in the last nine years can be categorised under 'durniti' (bad policies), 'anyay' (injustice) and - perhaps most importantly - 'badniyat' (ill intention)'
The Uttar Pradesh police will get a psychological test done on Ahmad Murtaza Abbasi, accused in the attack on security personnel outside Gorakhpur's Gorakhnath temple, a senior official said on Thursday.
Two days after Amar Singh resigned, actor Sanjay Dutt followed suit, resigning as Samajwadi Party's general secretary late Saturday night.
In a terse message to the ruling party, Priyanka in a Hindi tweet said, 'The goons of the BJP involved in 'cheerharan' of the democracy should hear that women will become pradhans, block pramukhs, MLAs, MPs and prime minister, and defeat the government, which gives patronage to those committing atrocities against women.'
Claiming that his party could come to power at the Centre, Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav on Saturday said the present political equations indicate that both Congress and Bharatiya Janata Party would not be able to get a majority in the 2014 general election.
The Samajwadi Party said those facing corruption charges have been inducted into the Union Council of Ministers.
The BJP is focusing on 160 seats 'we have never won, seats where we have reasonable support, and those we lost narrowly.'
Accusing the Congress party of doublespeak, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav on Monday demanded that the party either sack general secretary Digvijaya Singh or take action against Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Home Minister P Chidambaram on the Batla House encounter case.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's victory in the assembly polls on Thursday has put the party on a stronger wicket for the election for the post of President expected later this year.
The Bahujan Samaj Party on Thursday claimed that Election Commission decision of covering statues of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati and party symbol elephant is one-sided and unjustified and was a violation of Article 14 of the constitution.
While the Congress has not lost all hopes on ties with Trinamool Congress which announced the decision to withdraw from UPA, other parties like Samajwadi Party and Janata Dal-United blamed the government for putting itself in an embarrassing position.
The Congress needs to reorganise itself at the grassroots, infuse younger blood, and have more boots on the ground. Just offering freebies is not the answer anymore. Leadership matters, asserts Ramesh Menon.
Reflecting the growing bonhomie between the two parties, Congress has decided not to field any candidate against Uttar Pradesh Chief minister Akhilesh Yadav's wife Dimple Yadav, the Samajwadi Party candidate in the Kannauj Lok Sabha by-election.
Dimple Yadav, wife of Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, will contest the Kannauj Lok Sabha by-election as a Samajwadi Party candidate. "As per the wish of the party workers, the central parliamentary board of the party has decided that Dimple Yadav will contest the by-election for Kannauj seat," SP national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav told reporters. Akhilesh Yadav had contested from the Firozabad and Kannauj seat in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls.
Several Muslim organisations on Wednesday demanded dismissal of Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh and imposition of President's rule in the state, saying Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has failed to contain communal violence in Muzaffarnagar and surrounding areas.
Communist Party of India - Marxist general secretary Prakash Karat on Friday met Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and the two leaders are understood have discussed the pros and cons of probable candidates for the upcoming Presidential election.
Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, 11 parties on Tuesday got together with a vow to defeat Congress-led United Progressive Alliances and prevent the Bharatiya Janata Party from coming to power by presenting themselves as an alternative to them.
The 'Group of 23' leaders who participated included Ghulam Nabi Azad, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Anand Sharma, Mukul Wasnik, Prithviraj Chavan, Manish Tewari, Shashi Tharoor, besides Sibal who hosted the post-birthday dinner for them.
The number of policemen injured in them was 1,443 and 13 were killed, the data showed.
Gangster-turned-politician Atiq Ahmad's son Asad, wanted in the Umesh Pal murder case, was killed in an encounter with the Uttar Pradesh police in Jhansi on Thursday, officials said.
"Changes should be visible in six months and the manifesto should be implemented within a year as there is no guarantee when Lok Sabha elections are announced after that," Mulayam said, addressing party leaders and workers at a function to mark the 102nd anniversary of Dr Ram Manohar Lohia in Lucknow.
Setting aside their bitterness, both within and outside Parliament, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi shook hands at a function to felicitate NCP supremo Sharad Pawar, who turned 75 on Thursday.
'This move rendered the chiefs of important investigative agencies to the status of daily wage earners. It undermined the autonomy and independence of the agencies.'
While many exit polls have given either the Bharatiya Janata Party or Congress a majority in Uttarakhand, several of them have predicted a close fight between the two major players or a hung assembly -- a scenario in which the role of winning independents and candidates of regional outfits like the Aam Aadmi Party, the Samajwadi Party, the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Uttarakhand Kranti Dal will become significant in government formation.
Sixteen top officials of the Uttar Pradesh Construction Corporation were suspended by the Samajwadi Party-led state government for their alleged involvement in the multi-crore scam in the construction of the Kanshi Ram Memorial during Bahujan Samaj Party leader Mayawati's regime. The suspended officials include four general managers and a dozen project managers of the Uttar Pradesh Nirman Nigam.
Meanwhile, the Congress said that that it is ready to go it alone in Uttar Pradesh in the Lok Sabha election.