Amid continued disruption of Parliament, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has invited top Bharatiya Janata Party leaders for dinner on February 12 to seek their support for the passage of the crucial Telangana bill and other anti-corruption legislations in Parliament.
'The BJP think they are running an ideology machine in this country, and they have to convert everyone, from people to parties to party leaders.'
Union ministers Ravneet Singh Bittu and George Kurian were elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha Tuesday along with senior Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi and former minister Upendra Kushwaha.
"The government has made a U-turn. There is no divide among political parties. My party is not divided and we are very clear that the state of Telangana should be formed," BJP spokesman Prakash Javedakar said.
The key risk factors would be anti-incumbency, small vote share swings causing large impact on outcomes and the 2004 example.
The 1987-batch IPS officer, who retired in DGP rank in 2020, is currently running an NGO, which aims to bring cheers to the marginal sections of the society.
Electorally, the yatra seems to have paid dividends in the south, but the march does not seem to be helping the Congress in stopping the BJP's surge in the Hindi-heartland states.
Campaigning for May 13 elections in 96 Lok Sabha constituencies across 10 states and Union territories including all seats in Andhra Pradesh, where assembly elections are also being held concurrently, and Telangana concluded on Saturday evening.
While Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao has made his national ambitions amply clear, even rechristening his party to aid the process, his Tamil Nadu counterpart M K Stalin insists he is already in the national scene and used his birthday rally on March 1 to not only strongly pitch for the Congress as a force to reckon with in the efforts to dislodge the Narendra Modi-led dispensation at the Centre, but also sought to shoot down the prospects of a Third Front.
A total of 73 women got elected to the 18th Lok Sabha against 78 women MPs in the 17th Lok Sabha.
Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar on Friday said a wad of currency notes was recovered by security staff from the seat allotted to Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi.
The parties which gave chief ministers and sent scores of MPs to Parliament, drew a blank this time.
Addressing a poll rally at bypoll-bound Munugode Rao segment, Rao referred to the TRS MLAs case and said 'brokers' from Delhi came and attempted to bribe the MLAs by offering Rs 100 crore each.
Modi was born on September 17, 1950 in a small town in Gujarat.
For the first time, non-upper castes are in a majority in the board, as the party continues with its outreach to traditionally weaker and backward sections of society.
'It is not just about numbers. Sometimes coalitions and alliances have symbolic value.'
Telugu Desam Party supremo N Chandrababu Naidu will be sworn in as the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh for the third time on June 12, party sources said on Friday.
Here are glimpses of famous faces who got their fingers inked.
Uttar Pradesh and Bihar appear to have got the maximum representation in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's new council of ministers, while assembly poll-bound Maharashtra also found a significant presence.
The reverses for the BJP in the Hindi heartland threw wide open the 2019 Lok Sabha elections which until a few months ago appeared to be in the grip of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party.
Shah also challenged the Congress to implement its Lok Sabha election promise of providing Rs 8500 monthly to women in states ruled by the party.
As part of the programme, 14 states have been identified in the first phase in which there are 64 districts.
A senior official, who was part of the probe team, told reporters that prima facie there was encroachment of assigned land at Achampet.
If Naidu returns to the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance, he will be the second major regional leader to have done so after Janata Dal-United president and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar snapped ties with the opposition and joined its fold last month.
Deputy leader of BJP in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj and senior party leader M Venkaiah Naidu in the Rajya Sabha raised the issue in Zero Hour saying the government should bring a bill in right earnest.
'Barring Tamil Nadu and Kerala, the BJP will may make inroads in Karnataka, Andhra and Telangana in 2024.'
Reddy, who was an accused in a money-laundering case linked to the alleged liquor scam in Delhi, had turned an approver in the case that is being probed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED). The CBI is yet to file a chargesheet against him.
As results were declared for assembly elections in four states -- Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Telangana -- here are how some of the prominent candidates fared.
A new realignment should be expected in equations between the non-BJP, non-Congress parties and the government at the Centre. Aditi Phadnis reports.
Early trends from counting of votes on Tuesday threw up disappointing results for the BJP-led NDA in the Lok Sabha elections, which appears to be losing heavily in its strongholds of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan although it is expected to form the government with about 290 seats.
As the Rajya Sabha passed the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Bill 2014 on Thursday, giving birth to India's 29th state, Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt takes final stock of how it was accomplished.
Both the BJP and Congress understand that coalitions and alliances are not just about numbers, but have symbolic value.
According to the officials, the three-storey coaching institute, surrounded by residential and commercial establishments, had permission to use the basement as a store room, but it was being used as library in violation of the rules.
Bypolls are due in Bihar, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Telangana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu
As Modi takes guard for a third term with trusted and seasoned hands around him, the BJP is hopeful that he will prove his detractors wrong and continue to fuel the party's expansion horizontally and vertically with his inventive policies in government and new set of ideas in politics with the core of Hindutva, development and welfarism remaining intact.
The sources said the opposition leaders would now plan joint rallies that were put on hold due to the assembly elections.
The four TRS MLAs, who were allegedly lured with money to quit the party and join the BJP, complained of receiving threat calls by unidentified persons, police said on Monday.
The appointments holds significance as a large number of senior leaders, who had no organisational post currently, have now been given new responsibilities.
Opposition parties on Sunday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party after Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar and eight others were inducted into the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government, saying the ruling party's 'washing machine' has resumed its operation to clean tainted leaders and it was an 'ED-facilitated power grab'.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi ended his whirlwind Lok Sabha poll campaign with a rally in Punjab's Hoshiarpur on Thursday, closing out his electioneering the way he began -- by focussing on a region where he has invested heavily over the years for the Bharatiya Janata Party to make a mark outside its strongholds.
