The draft legislation seeks capital punishment for persons convicted of rape if their actions result in the victim's death or leave her in a vegetative state.
Trinamool Congress on Monday carried out a major organisational reshuffle in the party and inducted several new faces, including some ministers with thrust on toning up the party ahead of next year's crucial panchayat polls.
Expressing concern over agitation by Trinamool Congress workers outside the Central Bureau of Investigation office in Kolkata and elsewhere in West Bengal after the arrest of two ministers and others in the Narada sting case, Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Monday alleged that there is 'total lawlessness and anarchy' in the state and the police and administration are in 'silence' mode.
'Removing Biplab Deb and replacing him with Manik Saha is a fruitless exercise that the BJP national leadership has indulged in.' 'It is foolish to think that people will forget what these two have done to the state and its people in the last four years.'
The Trinamool Congress on Monday wrote to Kolkata Police Commissioner Soumen Mitra seeking 'necessary action' under the law against the Central Bureau of Investigaton officials who arrested three senior party leaders 'illegally'.
The Opposition unity to fight the Bharatiya Janata Party seems to have run into rough weather as the Trinamool Congress and the Congress are at daggers drawn over the recent instances of 'poaching' by the Mamata Banerjee-led camp, with the grand old party finding itself in a tight spot.
Voting for the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu were held on Wednesday.
Trinamool Congress MLA Madan Mitra and former party leader Sovan Chatterjee, who were arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation in the Narada sting case, were admitted to a hospital in Kolkata early on Tuesday after their health condition deteriorated in a correctional home, an official said.
The West Bengal assembly on Tuesday turned into a virtual battlefield with the ruling Trinamool Congress and Opposition Communist Party of India-Marxist members scuffling and trading blows resulting in injuries to three MLAs, with the Speaker suspending three Marxist members for the rest of the short winter session.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
Bengal ministers Firhad Hakim and Subrata Mukherjee were taken to the Central Bureau of Investigation office on Monday in connection with the Narada sting operation, officials said.
The biggest jolt the Congress came in 2019 when a group of its 10 MLAs, led by then leader of opposition Chandrakant Kavlekar, left the party together and joined the ruling BJP.
Senior Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee on Friday said he will participate in the party's protest programme in New Delhi on October 3, a day after he was summoned by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning in connection with the school jobs scam in Kolkata on the same day.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's decision to nominate Ananta Rai 'Maharaj', who has been demanding a separate state of 'Greater Cooch Behar' to be carved out of West Bengal, as its candidate for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections from the state, has kicked off a fresh storm with the ruling Trinamool Congress accusing the saffron party of fanning separatism in the state.
The brewing discontentment in the party may adversely impact the TMC's prospects in the next assembly polls due in April-May next year.
The unrest in the Sandeshkhali region of West Bengal ballooned into a major political row on Thursday as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee blamed the saffron camp of fomenting trouble in the area, while the Bharatiya Janata Party and the National Commission for Women (NCW) accused her party Trinamool Congress and the state government of being complicit in crimes against women in the area.
He also accused TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee of nepotism, insisting she wants to politically establish her nephew in West Bengal.
Hours after quitting as the MLA of the West Bengal Assembly, Rajib Banerjee on Friday resigned from the primary membership of the Trinamool Congress, intensifying speculation that he might soon switch over to the Bharatiya Janata Party.
The byelections are of critical importance to Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who lost the assembly poll to Bharatiya Janata Party's Suvendu Adhikari in Nandigram.
The bypoll on September 5 is also a litmus test for all three political outfits, with the BJP hoping to check its erosion in its vote share and retain the seat, the TMC aiming to wrest the tribal-dominated assembly segment and the CPI(M)-Congress alliance hoping to regain its traditional seat.
In yet another jolt the Congress ahead of the Goa Assembly polls, the party's state working president, Aleixo Reginaldo Lourenco, resigned as member of the legislative assembly on Monday, reducing the party's strength to two in the 40-member House.
Ironically, the BJP, which seeks to unseat the TMC from power, has taken a leaf out of Mamata Banerjee's strategy of soliciting tinsel town's support towards causes and fielding actors in elections.
In yet another jolt for the Trinamool Congress dispensation, West Bengal forest minister Rajib Banerjee quit the Mamata Banerjee cabinet, joining the growing list of dissenters who have put the ruling camp in a tight spot ahead of the assembly elections.
TMC demanded 'strong action' for the 'unfounded, inappropriate and illegal' campaign and utterances of Modi.
Once a reviled practice in the state, both the parties seem to have endorsed a record number of turncoats this time -- triggering a wave of discontentment among their loyalists.
Union Home Minister and top Bharatiya Janata Party leader Amit Shah on Thursday set a target of 200 out of the total 294 seats in the 2021 West Bengal assembly elections and to come to power in the state, party sources said.
Sukanta Majumdar, the state BJP president, said, "Amit Shah has set a target of 35 seats. We will achieve that".
Mamata Banerjee was on Friday unanimously elected as the leader of the Trinamool Congress legislature party at its meeting in Kolkata.
Speculations are rife that heavyweight Suvendu Adhikari, who quit the Trinamool Congress and gave up cabinet portfolios in the Mamata Banerjee government, may join BJP during Shah's visit along with a slew of disgruntled TMC leaders, including some MLAs such as Silbhadra Dutta and Jitendra Tiwari.
Trinamool Congress leadership is yet to take a call on ghar wapsi (return home) by former TMC leaders who had joined the BJP ahead of the recently concluded assembly elections which the Mamata Banerjee-led party swept.
The Enforcement Directorate has arrested West Bengal minister Jyotipriyo Mallick in a money laundering case linked to an alleged multi-core ration distribution scam in the state, official sources said on Friday.
CV Ananda Bose on Wednesday took oath as the new governor of West Bengal.
"BJP workers are coming in front of the vehicle of Chief Minister Banerjee and shouting 'Jai Shri Ram.' Is it fair to do so? Is it right to interrupt and come in front of the car of somebody? The hooligans are also after our MLAs and MPs and are shouting 'Jai Shri Ram.' We will not do any such mischievous thing and will not stop the way of prime minister," said Debashree Banerjee, a TMC worker.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Monday asserted that she would win the ongoing state polls despite injury and eventually aim for power in Delhi.
In Phase 6, indications are that the BJP, which is defending 40 seats, will lose in double digits and gain in single digits. Not good, if you are the ruling party scrambling to earn a working majority, with just one phase left to go, argues Prem Panicker.
Around 200 people belonging to the Sikh community staged a demonstration in front of the Bharatiya Janata Party office in Kolkata on Wednesday, expressing solidarity with an Indian Police Service officer who had alleged that West Bengal party leader Suvendu Adhikari labeled him as a 'Khalistani'.
The Congress on Friday suspended two of its legislators for voting for the Trinamool Congress in the Rajya Sabha biennial election for five seats in West Bengal.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among the 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday while Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27.
Should the anti-defection law in India exist only to prevent democratically elected governments from being toppled?
The Congress on Thursday secured a seat in the present Bengal assembly as its candidate Bayron Biswas won the Sagardighi bypoll, defeating the nearest rival of the Trinamool Congress by 22,980 votes.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances