Ugly scenes were witnessed in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday when Bharatiya Janata Party and Trinamool Congress members came to the verge of a clash over the Railway Budget whose withdrawl was demanded by members from West Bengal.
During the day-long debate, the lines between science and religion often got blurred with many invoking religious texts and the contribution of 'rishi munis' to highlight India's tryst with the extra-terrestrial world.
The Centre said it did not endorse the controversial statement of Jammu and Kashmir CM Mufti Mohammed Sayeed.
Bengali sub-nationalism is slowly emerging as a rallying cry ahead of the West Bengal assembly elections due next year.
Upset over political developments in Maharashtra, the Congress and other opposition parties boycotted Constitution Day celebrations in the Central Hall of Parliament and held a joint protest in front of the Ambedkar statue inside Parliament complex.
The Union Cabinet is soon likely to take up a bill to provide recognition to transgenders and protect their rights, Lok Sabha was informed on Friday.
The proposed law seeks bars on storing and processing of personal data by entities without the explicit consent of an individual. It, however, provides for exemptions for "reasonable purposes" such as "prevention and detection of any unlawful activity including fraud, whistle-blowing, merger and acquisitions, network and information security, credit scoring, recovery of debt, processing of publicly available personal data and the operation of search engines".
Adhikari joined the BJP amid Shah's two-day visit to West Bengal ahead of the assembly elections in 2021.
The 78-year-old Ahamed died at 2:15 am at RML hospital where he was admitted on Tuesday and put on artificial life support.
Piloting the Specified Bank Notes (Cessation of Liabilities) Bill, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said it will extinguish the government's liability towards scrapped notes and also eliminate the possibility of their bring used as parallel currency.
Opposition members on Thursday created ruckus in the Lok Sabha over the suicide of a farmer in New Delhi on Wednesday, leading to adjournment of proceedings even as the government said it was ready to discuss the matter.
Gadkari said the bill's early passage in Lok Sabha was necessary so that it could be moved to the Rajya Sabha for passage during the ongoing session, which ends on Friday.
A Trinamool Congress delegation met the Election Commission (EC) on Friday and demanded a high-level probe into an alleged attack on West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Nandigram and claimed it was not an 'unfortunate incident', but a conspiracy.
Excerpts from a speech on the Supplementary Demands for Grants, December 15.
'They have a voracious appetite.' 'But there are many places where they go and they lose.'
After Finance Minister Arun Jaitley moved the amended Finance Bill for consideration by the Lok Sabha, Deepender Hooda (Congress) said this was a "historic" occasion as never in the past had the Rajya Sabha amended the Finance Bill.
It is a tribute to India's democracy, however flawed, that the very same MPs who had harangued her intermittently from Opposition benches now surged towards her, anxiety writ large on their faces. One offered her some homoeopathic tablets, another advised her to stay seated, another grasped her hand wishing her good health... the crowd parted as Prime Minister Narendra Modi strode up to congratulate her. But it was mostly well-wishers from the Opposition and the NDA that kept the finance minister cocooned with good wishes until it was time to leave, reports Aditi Phadnis.
Lok Sabha Speaker on Wednesday referred the issue of some Trinamool Congress members allegedly accepting bribe, as shown in a purported sting operation, to the Ethics Committee, asking the L K Advani-headed panel to examine and investigate the charges.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said there is no alternative to the Trinamool Congress, and no other party can take its place in the state.
Participating in the debate on the triple talaq bill on Thursday, Khan made certain observations on a ruling party member.
'From now on, every time Modi takes a foreign dignitary in his arms, the Indians will remember how he was taken aback when an Indian indulged in hugplomacy,' says Amulya Ganguli.
'Whether the Hindu voter will vote for us or not, we can't say, can we?'
Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com gives the lowdown on the 59 seats spread across seven states and one Union territory going to polls in the last and final phase of the 2019 Lok Sabha elections on May 19, 2019.
A controversial bill which paves the way for the Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh by merging some villages and mandals of Telangana with Seemandhra was approved in the Lok Sabha on Friday, amid stiff opposition from the Telangana Rashtra Samithi, the Biju Janata Dal and some other parties.
Members in the Lok Sabha on Thursday expressed grave concern over hate crimes against Indians in the United States, with opposition parties questioning Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "silence" on the matter and the government saying it was being "viewed seriously".
If the BJP wins Bengal, would Kishor's indiscretions have played a significant role in that victory? Victory for the TMC would be another badge of honour in his CV, but defeat would raise an unsavoury question: Which party was Kishor actually working for? asks Payal Singh Mohanka.
'People say my personality doesn't have sharp edges, but politics doesn't have to be about pulling down your opponents or bad mouthing them.'
On Tuesday, police in Suri in West Bengal's Birbhum district used batons to disperse a rally where 'Jai Shri Ram' slogans were raised.
Heated exchanges were witnessed in Lok Sabha on Tuesday over the rising number of communal incidents.
Culture Minister Prahlad Patel asserted that national memorials cannot be 'political memorials' and they should be kept away from politics.
Ahead of the visit of an all-party delegation to Jammu and Kashmir, political parties on Saturday pitched for holding dialogue with "all stakeholders", including Hurriyat, to douse the unrest and banning the use of pellet guns by security forces.
Rejecting the opposition's charge that the bill will weaken the act, the government said it was fully committed to transparency and autonomy of the institution.
Responding to a discussion during Zero Hour in the Lower House, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said he was falling short of words to condemn the heinous crime.
The Bill provides for according Indian citizenship to the the Hindus, Jains, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Parsis from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan after six years of residence in India instead of 12 years even if they do not possess any document.
'Mamata Banerjee was an anti-body that the people of West Bengal needed to throw the CPI-M out. Though the disease is no more, we are suffering the anti-body. It is a punishment for the people of this state.' BJP leader Tathagatha Roy lashes out at the West Bengal chief minister.
No mention of cab aggregators in GST bills
The Minister assured the House that security requirement of the Election Commission will be met for free and fair assembly election in the state.
In Lok Sabha, the Opposition demanded action against cow vigilantes.
In a major embarrassment to the United Progressive Alliance government, Rahul Gandhi on Friday denounced the controversial ordinance to negate the Supreme Court verdict on convicted lawmakers as "complete nonsense" and said what "our government has done is wrong".
Rahul Gandhi's blunt denouncement of the ordinance on lawmakers was rubbished by the opposition with the Bharatiya Janata Party calling it a "desperate and belated" damage control exercise and saying Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should quit if he had any self-respect.
