Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh and his party colleague Ram Gopal Yadav along with eight other new members of Parliament were administered oath by Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari on Wednesday.
A post-poll survey conducted by CNN-IBN, The Week and CSDS in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Uttarakhand and Manipur has revealed some interesting results. The Samajwadi Party will win 34 per cent of the total vote share of the UP polls, according to the survey.
Neeraj Shekhar won the prestigious Ballia Lok Sabha by-election by a margin of over 1,30,000 votes over his nearest rival, Bahujan Samaj Party's Vinay Shankar Tewari.
Blaming the Bahujan Samaj Party and the Samajwadi Party for neglecting the plight of Bundelkhand, Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday said the Centre took the initiative and provided a Rs 8,000-crore package to the region despite it being the responsibility of the state government.
Playing the secular card like Bahujan Samaj Party, Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Janta Dal on Tuesday helped the United Progressive Alliance government in comfortably shaking off the Opposition challenge of cut motions.
Those disqualified by Speaker Somnath Chatterjee are Bhalchandra Yadav (Khalilabad), Ramakant Yadav (Azamgarh) and Mohammad Shahid Akhlaque and their seats in the House have been declared vacant. Petitions for their disqualification were filed by the BSP under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution (anti-defection law) on the ground that the three MPs had voluntarily given up the membership of their party and joined the Samajwadi Party.
According to the latest head count by Congress's managers, the United Progressive Alliance has only 271 seats in the Lok Sabha, though the requisite majority in the 545-member House is 273. For the ruling party, the issue is not about saving the government, but about crossing the majority mark to send the decisive signal that the UPA enjoys a clear majority and has the moral right to continue in power, say sources.
The RLD has aligned with the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party in UP and is attacking the state government on farm distress and the outstanding sugarcane dues.
Voting in the Rajya Sabha on the Women's Reservation Bill was deferred by a day on Monday.
Naidu is keen to enrol BSP into the 'Third Front', known as UNPA to fill the gap left by the departure of Mulayam Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party recently to join hands with the UPA.
Alleging that the Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajwadi Party have failed to live up to the expectations of the people, Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi on Thursday said a change was needed by forming a government which works for all.
Flaying the Mayawati government's decision to dedicate schemes worth Rs 7000 crore to the Bahujan Samaj Party founder Kanshi Ram, Samajwadi Party on Wednesday questioned the late Dalit leader's contribution to Uttar Pradesh and termed it as an attempt to 'Kanshimarise' state capital Lucknow.
The first and the foremost achievement of the Mayawati government has been creating a perception of putting an end to much-maligned 'transfer-posting' industry.
Babbar was elected from Agra as its Lok Sabha MP twice -- in 1999 and 2004. However, following delimitation in 2008, the Lok Sabha seat became reserved for the scheduled castes.
"He is the only secular leader of our country who has worked with Mahatma Gandhi, Jai Prakash Narain and Ram Manohar Lohia, and he is the only leader who can save the nation and its people in the coming years," the SP's Assam unit general secretary Ratul Kumar Choudhury said.
"I have already floated this idea to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Jan Morcha patron V P Singh and now the ball is in their court," Paswan, also the Union Steel and Fertilizers Minister, told reporters in Lucknow.
Members of the Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajwadi Party on Thursday forced the adjournment of the Rajya Sabha for an hour, over the alleged inflammatory remarks made by Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee chief Bahuguna Joshi, against state Chief Minister Mayawati.Unrelenting BSP and SP members continued to raise the issue and the Left parties too supported them. As the din continued, Ansari adjourned the house till 12 pm.
BSP leader Swami Prasad Maurya earlier alleged in the Assembly that an SP MP from Allahabad was involved in the incident and demanded a CBI inquiry into the matter.
Mulayam, who was accompanied by his trusted aide Amar Singh is understood to have discussed with Ajit Singh a plan to topple the Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition government in UP.
Pitted against Samajwadi Party's nominee actor Sanjay Dutt and Bahujan Samaj Party's Akhilesh Das, the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate from Lucknow Lalji Tandon on Wednesday said the character of the city is very different as none of the film stars or businessmen has ever been able to find success in this Lok Sabha seat.
Candidates contesting from Kunda (in Pratapgarh), Malhani (in Jaunpur), and Rasara (in Ballia) failed to secure enough votes to prevent forfeiture of their deposits.
The seized properties include a hospital building at Bhavani Nagar in Nauchandi and two luxury cars that Qureshi had allegedly purchased in the name of his family members and employees, they said.
Even as the Parliament was paralysed for the 11th day over the coal block allocation, the unruly side of its two of its members shocked the nation on Wednesday.
She launched a frontal attack on her arch rival, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav, and left no stone unturned to woo the state's 17 per cent Muslim electorate.
Reaching out to the ruling party in Uttar Pradesh, which has 17 MPs in the Lok Sabha, Communist Party of India-Marxist General Secretary Prakash Karat drove to the Uttar Pradesh chief minister's residence in New Delhi to hold the first meeting after the Left parties withdrew support to the United Progressive Alliance government over the nuclear deal.
Shahid Siddiqui, who defected from the Samajwadi Party, sang a different tune two days ago when he defended the nuclear deal in an exclusive interview with rediff.com
AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Monday brainstormed with senior Congress leaders from Uttar Pradesh on the preparations for next year's assembly polls, as the party resolved to hit the streets against the Bharatiya Janata Party government over issues such as unemployment, price rise and law and order.
"Mayawati had sent offers to me to join BSP and threatened that otherwise I will be left doing rounds of courts and made to languish in jail," he told reporters in Lucknow. The SP general secretary also alleged that independent MLA Mukhtar Ansari, accused in Bharatiya Janata Party MLA Krishnand Rai murder case, and BSP MP Akbar Ahmad Dampi conspired to kill him during the recently-held Lok Sabha bypolls in UP.
Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati on Sunday alleged the law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh is deteriorating under Samajwadi Party rule and people will realise that a "bad government" has come to power in the state.
The two parties named the seats distributed among them in a statement signed by SP president Akhilesh Yadav and BSP chief Mayawati.
UP bypolls: SP-RLD combine wins all 4 bypoll seats.
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.
The outcome of the polls to the Rajya Sabha is likely to have an impact in the politically crucial state just ahead of the general elections in the country.
Mayawati made it amply clear that her party will not enter into any alliance with the Congress.
Congress veteran Kapil Sibal had on Wednesday filed his nomination as an SP-backed Independent candidate for the Rajya Sabha polls.
Moments after being expelled from Samajwadi Party, Amar Singh on Tuesday struck a defiant note ruling out quitting his Rajya Sabha seat and termed as baseless reports about his cosying up to Congress, Nationalist Congress Party and Bahujan Samaj Party.
Umesh Pal's family thanked Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and the police.
In the Upper House of Parliament, where the Lokpal Bill is likely to be taken up on Wednesday, the Congress does not have majority on its own or with its allies in the UPA.