The great Indian election is over and now the wait for the results is shrinking with every passing moment. Though exit polls hint at a cakewalk for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his National Democratic Alliance, there are some battles which will be keenly observed on the result day.
Eyeing for return to power in Delhi after a gap of 15 years, the Bharatiya Janata Party will kick off its election campaign at a rally in New Delhi on Tuesday, coinciding with the birthday of its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.
The Congress party's first list of 194 Lok Sabha candidates released on Saturday night has no major surprises. Anita Katyal reports
Aam Aadmi Party leader Shazia Ilmi brought the house down at the concluding session of the Jaipur Literature Festival when -- during a debate on democracy --she declared, "In a democracy, everyone has the right to protest, including the chief minister". Sanchari Bhattacharya reports from Jaipur.
There are also views within a section of the party that a turnaround in Uttar Pradesh is possible only if either of the Gandhis -- Priyanka or Rahul -- takes the lead in the state polls.
'For a party with a fuzzy ideology, one that lives only for power, having a leadership that thought vaguely about returning to power in the distant future was a distinct handicap,' points out Mihir S Sharma.
Activist-turned-politician Arvind Kejriwal will take oath as Delhi's seventh chief minister on Saturday at historic Ramlila Maidan in New Delhi, capping his party's stunning electoral debut in the December 4 assembly polls. The date for the swearing-in ceremony was finalised at a meeting Kejriwal held with Chief Secretary D M Spolia.
From Bollywood strong men to cricketing greats, celebrities upped the glam quotient this poll season. Some we will see as future MPs, the others just have to get back to business. Rediff.com takes a look at some popular faces, who fought Election 2019 and here's the verdict on them.
'Judging by the conduct of two governors of Kerala and one governor from Kerala, Congressmen treated Raj Bhavan as a transition point before taking a flight back into active politics.'
No one else filed papers till Sunday, according to Mullapally Ramachandran, the chairman of the party's Central Election Authority.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Centre to take a decision on dissolution of Delhi assembly "one way or another" within five weeks, questioning it for continuing to keep the house in suspended animation when no party is coming forward to form the government.
'The Congresswallahs will hope that Arvind Kejriwal's oratory and confidence will be the anti-aircraft guns to Narendra Modi's airwave-capturing force. Both Kejriwal and Modi speak Hindi well. Both are supremely self-confident about their agenda and vision. Some of their catch-phrases -- 'Vande Mataram' and 'Bharat Mata Ki Jai' -- are identical. Both are inspiring figures for their cadres. Both are not hesitant at all to wear their faith in Bhagwan on their foreheads on public platforms.' Sheela Bhatt believes that the 2014 election will be a Kejriwal versus Modi battle.
Congress sources have said that the party is seriously considering withdrawing support to the AAP. Senior party leader Janardan Dwivedi said there was an opinion in the party that the decision to support AAP was perhaps not correct and it should have instead raised people's issues as an opposition. Renu Mittal reports.
Dikshit cites lack of party support for delhi debacle; Pawar prescribes introspection; No party ready to form govt in Delhi
'Rahul is misguided by a handful of family retainers who don't want him to show unrestrained initiative in forming allies.' says Sudhir Bisht.
'The Congress's allies won't be left behind in looking out for their own interests. Some will demand a bigger share of the ministerial or electoral pie, others will simply jump ship,' says T V R Shenoy.
'Modi and the BJP don't want Delhi to function.' 'The LG is like a puppet of the BJP.'
The Congress, out of power in UP for 27 years is making a big pitch to bounce back, on a cocktail of caste politics and promises of agriculture debt waiver worth Rs 49,000 crore and power rate reduction for farmers hit by high input costs and diminishing returns., reports Amit Agnihotri.
Hitting back at Arvind Kejriwal over the DDCA row, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Thursday accused him of spreading "false propaganda", saying he seems to believe in untruth and defamation and delivers a language that borders on hysteria.
The Congress president said that if he was allowed to speak for 15 minutes on a host of issues, including the Nirav Modi scam, PM Modi would "run away".
SP-Congress alliance is likely to consolidate Muslim vote in their favour.
The results are being seen as a ringing endorsement of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's policies and a reflection of his unmatched popularity.
"It cannot be more unfortunate than the fact that you need somebody to make you realise the promises you have made to the public and you end up expelling that person from the party," the Laxmi Nagar MLA told reporters soon after he was expelled from the party.
The party said that the Delhi cricket body had become a den of corruption during Jaitley's 13-year rule.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the Centre to apprise it by October 10 about the outcome of political process initiated by the Lt Governor by writing a letter to the President on exploring the possibility of government formation in Delhi.
While all political parties have been talking about following in the footsteps of the debutant Aam Admi Party by fielding fresh faces in the coming Lok Sabha polls, Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-U leader Nitish Kumar has set the ball rolling by deciding not to renominate his party's three sitting MPs in the coming biennial elections to the Rajya Sabha scheduled for February 7. Anita Katyal reports.
In a brief statement, Jung's office said he has submitted his resignation to the government of India and that he would be returning back to academics, 'his first love'.
Modi will need to understand that the formula for success will have to be Local Leaders + Modi and not Modi alone...Shivraj Singh Chouhan is in the running for prime minister... The AAP will have to ally with other parties if it hopes to make any dent in the Lok Sabha election. Dr B Venkatesh Kumar, Professor at the Centre for Governance and Public Policy at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, lists some learnings from the 2013 assembly election results.
The Delhi High Court on Tuesday issued notices to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Law Minister Somnath Bharti on separate pleas of two BJP leaders seeking to declare their election as void on the ground that they exceeded the poll expense limit of Rs 14 lakh each.
As rumblings in Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party over chief ministerial candidate continue, its chief Vijay Goel on Monday said he was not a contender for the position but sought an early decision on the contentious issue which has virtually split the party and derailed its campaign for the polls.
With the tide of public disillusionment rising against his government, Arvind Kejriwal is trying at least publicly to extend the olive branch to both Narendra Modi and Najeeb Jung. Privately, he has confided to his confidantes that much as he dislikes it, he must do his best to soften these two reigning deities.
The street-fighter is back and the introspecting, sparingly speaking avatar of Kejriwal has gone on an extended recess. In this grime of heightened Delhi politics, all the good work done by the Delhi government may go down the drain, warns Sudhir Bisht.
Taking a jibe at the Narendra Modi government over its 'Clean India Mission', Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Thursday alleged that angry people are running the nation.
If the BJP is waiting for a better assessment about the assembly polls, the Congress is doing the same to see if it should club the 2014 Lok Sabha elections with the assembly polls. says Anita Katyal
'Kejriwal's way of working is 'my way or the highway'. If you don't say Kejriwal zindabad then you will be thrown out of the party.' 'I feel Kejriwal is a very darpook (frightened) man. When he lost in the Lok Sabha elections his strength disappeared and he started compromising.' Aam Aadmi Party rebel Pankaj Pushkar speaks out.
A clean sweep for the BJP and the emergence of the AAP do not look good for the Congress, which now faces a serious leadership crisis, says Bharat Bhushan
From President Pranab Mukherjee's son Abhijit to Rahul and Varun Gandhi, at least 50 parliamentary constituencies will be contested by 'sons and daughters' of politicians of various parties during the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
Digvijaya Singh is no longer in Rahul's close circle of advisers. His move to the Upper House was to ensure that the senior leader does not meddle in Madhya Pradesh politics in the run up to the crucial Lok Sabha polls. Anita Katyal reports
Former editor of Femina magazine, Sathya Saran looks back at the Miss India pageant that changed the lives of two young women.
