A purported video of three monks being attacked by a mob in West Bengal's Purulia over suspicion that they were 'kidnappers in disguise' has triggered a political row, with opposition Bharatiya Janata Party alleging collapse of law and order in the state.
'The BJP's modus operandi is not just to be intolerant of dissent, it is to create mistrust and doubt between communities and the electoral process itself.'
BJP won 18 of the seats while the TMC won 22 of the seats.
The ruling Trinamool Congress on Tuesday said that the resignation of Laxmi Ratan Shukla as West Bengal minister of state for youth services and sports is unfortunate but it will not affect the party, while the Bharatiya Janata Party said that the former cricketer is welcome to join the saffron camp.
A voter turnout of 60.19 per cent was recorded till 5 pm in the third phase of Lok Sabha elections in 93 constituencies spread over 11 states and Union Territories on Tuesday with sporadic incidents of violence in West Bengal.
He asserted that the concept of 'one flag, one prime minister, one Constitution' was not a political slogan and the Bharatiya Janata Party firmly believes in the principle and finally implemented it with regard to Jammu and Kashmir.
The BJP state unit hailed Vasan and said his advice will be used in the coming days to guide the alliance.
Although there has been no official communication by the party leadership in this regard, the sources said MPs over 65 years of age have been advised not to attend the session.
The Centre on Tuesday issued a 'Leave India' notice and cancelled the business visa given to the actor.
The BJP deputed Shah as observer to Uttar Pradesh, where Yogi Adityanath powered the party to an impressive victory and where there are no hurdles in the way of the priest-politician's second stint in power.
As the Bharatiya Janata Party, which the former Union minister and two-time MP quit in 2021, and the Trinamool engage in a verbal war ahead of the general elections due in a couple of months' time, Babul Supriyo is very clear that if the BJP wins, as is widely expected, "democracy may not exist in India."
Congress President and Leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday questioned Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman over the Union Budget and claimed that the plates of all states except Bihar and Andhra Pradesh were empty in the budget allocation.
Several leaders of the TMC slammed the rural development minister for his comments on the chief minister attending the Kolkata International Film Festival.
The Trinamool Congress registered a decisive victory in West Bengal on Sunday, contrary to results of most exit polls which predicted a tight race between the BJP and the TMC with an edge to the Mamata Banerjee-led party.
Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee and several other party leaders were detained on Tuesday night as they held a dharna at the Union Rural Development Ministry office in New Delhi demanding a meeting with the minister and released around three hours later.
Lok Sabha MP Mahua Moitra on Wednesday moved the Supreme Court against two ordinances brought out by the Centre under which the tenure of directors of the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate can now be extended by up to three years after the mandated term of two years.
They stated that when a soldier fights for the nation, he does so not as a Hindu, Muslim, or any other religion, but as a patriot.
The EC said polling percentage in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat in Jammu and Kashmir is the highest in 40 years.
An approximate voter turnout of 59.06 per cent was recorded in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha elections on Saturday in 58 constituencies across six states and two Union territories with the polling percentage in the Jangal Mahal region of West Bengal touching 78.19.
Villagers alleged that a seven-month-old child was snatched from her mother's lap and thrown away by miscreants in Sandeshkhali.
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.
Kharge alleged that Dhankhar is working as a government spokesperson and acting like a school headmaster, often sermonising experienced opposition leaders and preventing them from speaking in the House.
Voting for the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu were held on Wednesday.
Ramesh said he would file a case against Thakur in the apex court as the police in Karnataka would not act against the BJP MP.
Besides the national capital, polling will be held Saturday in 14 seats in Uttar Pradesh, all 10 seats of Haryana, eight seats each in Bihar and West Bengal, six seats in Odisha, four seats in Jharkhand and one seat in Jammu and Kashmir. Simultaneously, polling will be held for 42 assembly constituencies in Odisha.
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.
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.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday named 72 more candidates for the Lok Sabha elections, including Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal and Anurag Singh Thakur, and former chief ministers Manohar Lal Khattar, Trivendra Singh Rawat and Basavaraj Bommai.
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.
'The political situation in the country will depend on the electoral outcome in Maharashtra.'
Healthcare services remained affected at state-run hospitals in West Bengal as junior doctors continued their cease-work protest.
Bidhuri, the BJP MP from South Delhi, had faced strong criticism over his "derogatory" comments against Bahujan Samaj Party MP Danish Ali in the Lok Sabha.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday appealed to the people to ensure the Bharatiya Janata Party's victory in 35 seats out of the 42 in West Bengal in the next Lok Sabha polls, saying that the Trinamool Congress government would not survive beyond 2025 if the target is achieved.
Among the keenly watched contests are those involving former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav (Kannauj, UP) and Union ministers Giriraj Singh (Begusarai, Bihar), Nityanand Rai (Ujiarpur, Bihar) and Raosaheb Danve (Jalna, Maharashtra).
Former Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra on Friday vacated her government accommodation in New Delhi, her lawyer said.
The TMC leader, who was expelled from the Lok Sabha on December 8 last year, was earlier asked to vacate the house by January 7 after her allotment was cancelled.
Singh targeted the Congress using a 'snakes and ladders' analogy, saying the party will fall to zero from 99 after being bitten by a snake -- referring to the grand old party winning 99 seats in the Lok Sabha polls.
The ruling Trinamool Congress claimed that the strike call exposed the BJP's game plan to foment disturbances in the state exploiting people's pain over the alleged rape and murder of a woman doctor.
Former West Bengal chief minister and a front-ranking Marxist leader Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee will go down in the country's history as a pragmatic communist who kept aside his ideological convictions to woo capital for the industrialisation of his state.
Embroiled in a battle for survival, Left parties marginally improved their performance in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, leading in eight to 10 seats according to vote counting trends.
