At a time when the BJP's stars are at the top on the eve of the Lok Sabha polls, the Puri-Joshimath Sankaracharyas may have kick-started a row whose efforts might be to divide Hindus, not in the name of castes, but on what passes for greater belief, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Reacting to the results, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said that in the by-elections held on 13 seats in seven states, the people of the country have given their support to the INDIA bloc.
Senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar also said that an alliance similar to the one stitched up in Bihar is needed at the national level for the next Lok Sabha elections.
In the 2009 election, P Chindambaram the Sivaganga seat by a narrow margin. Then the Congress was in alliance with the ruling DMK. This time his son Karti is battling the seat with the alliance. India abstention at the UNHRC on an anti-Lanka resolution will further fuel Tamil anger against the Congress party. This leaves the finance minster sulking and his son facing an uphill political debut, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
Party leaders, sources said, maintained that Congress cannot afford to have a new leader at the helm for rebuilding the organisation at this juncture and that the responsibility for the defeat is collective and not individual.
To a question on switching loyalties between one party to another, she said she would stay put with the BJP for all time.
The original suggestion was to call it 'Indian National Democratic Inclusive Alliance', but the word 'democratic' was replaced with 'developmental' after Kumar and Yechury raised some objections saying it sounded too similar to the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA), sources said.
A slow and ineffective response to allegations of scams under the erstwhile United Progressive Alliace government strengthened anti-Congress impressions in the minds of voters, which resulted in the party's poor show in the Lok Sabha polls, senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar said on Thursday.
The BJP will enter this election, as it does every election, as if it is fighting to prevent a 2004-style defeat. This is a party that wins big because it always behaves as if its back is to the wall, predicts Mihir S Sharma.
The BJP is focusing on 160 seats 'we have never won, seats where we have reasonable support, and those we lost narrowly.'
Speaking exclusively to rediff.com's Anita Katyal, Narayansamy recalled that Rajiv was to address a public meeting in Puducherry the morning after his rally in Sriperumbudur but unfortunately it was not to be.
'Bihar, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Bengal can be the game changers of 2024.'
With this kind of coinage, the Opposition seems to be readily conceding the point that Modi is taller than all of them put together. So they need something bigger than themselves, collectively or not, to capture the voter imagination when it is about taking on Modi and the BJP in 2024, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
With the presidential elections over, the time has come for Prime Minister Modi to show Tamil Nadu that the state's interests are safe under him, says R Rajagopalan.
The Congress leader said he has traversed across the country, "but I have not seen violence, hatred anywhere. But I see it on television all the time."
It would be best that Rahul remains party chief, but at the same time, Rahul's own wishes must also be respected, Aiyar said.
The 79-year old leader, who served as the chief minister of Kerala twice, breathed his last in a private hospital in Bengaluru at 4.25 am. His end came while undergoing treatment for cancer, party sources said.
The current question is about the BJP-ruled Centre, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, like its predecessors, not arguing the Union of India's case effectively and continuously, whenever the matter came up in the past, if its case still was that Rajiv's killing was an 'act of terror', asks N Sathiya Moorthy.
Congress is riven by four different approaches to an issue: the Sonia Gandhi way, the Rahul Gandhi method, Lok Sabha MPs' tactic, and Rajya Sabha MPs' style, reports R Rajagopalan.
With the Congress down in the dumps and the BJP juggernaut on a roll, 'secular' parties are attempting to revive the Janata Parivar coalition to fill the vacuum.
Sheela Bhatt recounts the tension, suspense and disruptions during P Chidambaram's interim budget in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
With a decision on the Telangana issue imminent, Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said the situation in Andhra Pradesh is peaceful.
'What you need is a credible Opposition, a credible platform to persuade people to believe that it can replace this government.'
The Congress is planning to call a meeting of Opposition parties in May. It is possible to keep all possibilities open in case Karnataka yields a hung House, leading to a recalibrated Opposition.
Amid the political controversy over India's participation in the Commonwealth Heads of Government meet in Sri Lanka, the Congress top brass on Friday met to take a call on whether Prime Minister Manmohan Singh should attend the event.
Ending suspense, the Bharatiya Janata Party has picked actor-turned-politician Smriti Irani to take on Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi in Amethi.
'If there is anyone who is a victim of vendetta politics, it is me.'
After Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra began criss-crossing the Hindi heartland, BJP leaders have revived their attacks on 'dynasty politics' and 'family rule' in the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
After tweeting about Bharatiya Janata Party prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and the latter's refusal to wear a skullcap, Congress leader and Union Minister Shashi Tharoor said that it just showed his bigotry. He said the BJP leader had been seen wearing different kinds of headgear, some even 'outlandish', "but the skullcap is one headgear he rejects and it is to send a signal of bigotry and rejection of our Muslim brothers and sisters".
Sheela Bhatt lists ten quick takeaways from the passage of the Telangana bill in the Lok Sabha.
The second meeting of the NITI Aayog's governing council, was, however, attended by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
He also asserted that within 24 hours of taking oath, he would prove the majority on the floor of the House.
Congress MP Shantaram Naik on Monday gave notice of breach of privilege against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Defence Minister Manohar Parrikkar to Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari on a day Congress created a ruckus in Parliament against Modi's comments in an election rally against Sonia Gandhi on the VVIP chopper deal.
BJP sources suggest that the upcoming elections will likely revolve around the renewed enthusiasm for the temple unless another theme with religious and nationalist undertones emerges.
Obviously, the not-so warm vibes between the two during the recent election season is a thing of the past, with Jaya scheduled to offer the Tamil angavastram as a mark of respect to Modi in his South Block office.
Raut also said the "ongoing Mahabharat" in West Bengal is more fierce than the real Mahabharat.
Most leaders agreed for early finalisation of poll plans for 2024 stressing that there was no time left with them and mere meetings would not help.
Trying to guess Subramanian Swamy's motives or next step has been a rather difficult exercise for decades, says Archis Mohan
The BJP accused Congress members of bringing "shame" to Lok Sabha with their "unruly" conduct in the House.
Top leaders of the Opposition's Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) held talks in an informal setting in Mumbai on Thursday evening to chart out a concrete roadmap and evolve a structure for cooperation among the alliance partners to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
