'If democracy does not exist, if there are no political spaces, there is no media, there is no civil society, what do we rejoice?'
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which pulled off a hat-trick of wins in Haryana by bucking anti-incumbency, managed to make significant inroads into the Dalit seats and Jat strongholds.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday termed as "very dangerous" External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid's comments questioning the role of the Supreme Court and Election Commission and said the two institutions must take suo motu cognisance of it.
Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal on Friday described the electoral bonds scheme as a 'very big scam' and demanded that a special investigation team (SIT) be set up with court-appointed officials to probe the alleged quid pro quo and wrongdoings under it.
It said that enacting a law that a minister, who is also a lawmaker, gets suspended automatically, if he or she is in judicial custody for over 48 hours, falls within the domain of the legislature.
A landmark bill to replace the collegium system of judges choosing judges was on Thursday passed in the Lok Sabha after government dropped a controversial provision that required unanimity in recommendation if the President seeks reconsideration.
Democracy does not begin and end with elections and the integrity of election process is pivotal for sustaining the democratic form of government, the Supreme Court said on Thursday while striking down as unconstitutional the electoral bonds scheme for political funding.
"If you see in the context of alliances and statistics, then this is the strongest alliance government," Modi said while addressing newly-elected MPs and leaders of the NDA from across the country following his election as leader of the ruling bloc ahead of his government's swearing-in on Sunday.
For the last four years since abrogation of Article 370, Kashmir-based political parties have been struggling to forge an alternate narrative to the one forcibly snatched from them. The BJP is bound to go hammer and tongs at them now that their armoury is reinforced with the Supreme Court judgment, notes Mohammad Sayeed Malik, the veteran commentator on Kashmir affairs.
Results showed that Solih, who had the backing of a united opposition trying to oust Yameen, secured 58.3 per cent of the popular vote.
Union minister and Bharatiya Janata Party leader Raosaheb Danve on Monday claimed 12 members of Parliament of Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena are in touch with the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde faction and are ready to cross over.
'This means the remedy will be worse than the disease. The thing which you want to avoid will happen.'
Law Minister Kiren Rijiju on Saturday invoked the constitutional 'Lakshman Rekha' guiding different institutions, including the executive and the judiciary, and wondered that if judges become part of administrative appointments, who would carry out judicial work.
Should NOTA ever get the maximum number of votes (which makes it the 'winner'), then a re-election should be held and all the candidates should be disqualified.'
The litigation in the present case relates to the existence of two birth certificates of Abdullah Azam who allegedly gave the wrong date of birth while filing his nomination papers for the 2017 poll.
A bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud took note of the submissions of senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for Thackeray, and sought response of the faction led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Shinde.
'A political party taking the law into its hands is objectionable, especially in the context of the 2002 incidents in Gujarat.'
Freebies being doled out by the Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan governments ahead of the assembly polls Friday came under scrutiny by the Supreme Court which sought responses from the two states, the Centre and the Election Commission on a PIL alleging misuse of public money.
The Supreme Court on Thursday proposed that the Board of Control for Cricket in India elections can be held next month but the people named in the Justice Mudgal Commission report, which probed the betting and spot-fixing in the sixth edition of Indian Premier League in 2013, must be kept out.
Elections in Jammu and Kashmir can be held "anytime from now" as the work on updation of voters list is almost over, the Centre told the Supreme Court on Thursday but remained non-committal about setting a time-frame for restoration of statehood to the Union territory (UT).
The "opaque" electoral bonds scheme for funding political parties will "destroy democracy" as it promotes corruption and does not allow a level playing field between the ruling and opposition parties, the petitioners challenging the validity of the scheme told the Supreme Court, which on Tuesday observed election funding was a "complicated issue".
The ECI data covers 20,421 bonds worth Rs 12,769 crore. The ADR data, however, collated information on 27,811 bonds worth Rs 16,492 crore. The gap is nearly Rs 4,000 crore and involves over 7,000 bonds.
Asserting that the dharma yudham is on, Panneerselvam, popularly known as OPS said he and his followers would go to the people to seek justice.
Police personnel removed him and his supporters from the protest site as they were holding the demonstration near a restricted area, and thus it was "illegal", a senior officer said.
'They might not have liked his judgments on IT rules, the Election Commission and Pondicherry.'
Meerut Police's action came a day after the MP indirectly blamed Muslims for the population growth in the country.
Right to Information activist Anjali Bhardwaj said the VVPAT system should be re-calibrated to be fully voter-verifiable.
The Supreme Court on Friday held that a person associated or employed with the Centre or the state government cannot work as a state election commissioner, who needs to be an independent person.
A plea challenging the Election Commission's decision to conduct assembly elections over eight phases in West Bengal was filed in the Supreme Court on Monday.
This is for the first time that the Thackeray family has lost control of the party that was founded in 1966 by Balasaheb Thackeray on the principles of justice for the sons of the soil.
As leaders in both the BJP and Congress concede, neither has within their parties a leader to match Arvind Kejriwal's charisma in Delhi.
The high court had on May 12, nullified 2017 election of Chudasama on the ground of malpractice and manipulation and have also refused to stay of the operation of the order till the disposal of his appeal
The Maharashtra government will bring an ordinance to grant OBC quota in upcoming by-elections to a set of local governing bodies without crossing the Supreme Court-mandated 50 per cent cap on reservation, said state minister Chhagan Bhujbal on Wednesday.
Fadnavis on Saturday said the ruling Eknath Shinde-BJP coalition in Maharashtra is a legitimate government.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday took note of the Eknath Shinde faction's claim about the Uddhav Thackeray camp stalling the proceedings before the poll panel where the former's application staking claim over the Shiv Sena and its symbol is pending, and said it will consider listing its plea before a Constitution bench.
Soren's comment comes in the wake of the governor saying on October 27 that he has sought a "second opinion" in the case and claimed that an "atom bomb could explode any time in Jharkhand", apparently indicating to his pending decision in the matter.
A revealing excerpt from Mani Shankar Aiyar's fascinating new book, The Rajiv I Knew.
An average voter turnout of 20 per cent was recorded in the first four hours of voting in the bypolls to 15 assembly seats spread across Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Kerala and Uttarakhand on Wednesday amid an incident of stone pelting in a village in UP's Meerapur and allegations of police personnel deterring voters from casting their ballot.
The apex court observed that it respects the local sentiments but asserted authorities cannot let the law of the land not prevail especially when there is nothing affecting the personal rights or personal laws.
The apex court, which had passed an order on May 10 and noted that no reservation for OBCs can be provisioned until the triple test formality is completed 'in all respects' by the state government, permitted the state to notify the reservation pattern local body wise as delineated in the reports of the dedicated commission.
