The Congress high command has sent across a stern message to Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy that he will be disqualified if he does not toe the party line on the Telangana issue.
Shinde also said directives will be issued to give the Kunbi caste certificates to blood relatives of a person who already possesses similar documents.
In the midst of mounting pressure from both pro and anti-Telangana leaders, Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ahead of the crucial United Progressive Alliance and Congress working committee meetings to take a final decision on the separate statehood issue.
The counting of votes will take place on November 6, the poll panel said in a statement.
The Bharatiya Janata Party returned to power in Rajasthan on Sunday, winning 115 seats out of the 199 where assembly elections were held last week.
Fast-unto-death by Congress Member of Parliament L Rajagopal and several other leaders, pressing for a unified Andhra Pradesh continued on Wednesday even as Chiranjeevi-led Praja Rajyam Party came under pressure from its MLAs to end its support for a separate Telangana.
'The feeling in Telangana is that without her a separate state cannot be created... All the MPs and MLAs from Seema-Andhra have a business background. Their interest is to save their business,' Congress MP K Raj Gopal Reddy, who played a key role in Thursday's turbulent events, tells Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt.
Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, a strong political stakeholder in Hyderabad, has expressed apprehensions that the central government was contemplating giving the city the status of an Union Territory while creating Telangana state and warned that the party will fight tooth and nail against any such move.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Wednesday said he aspired to become the CM of the state and also took a jibe at his 83-year-old uncle asking when will the Maratha strongman retire from active politics, as he appeared to be ahead in the numbers game for control of the Nationalist Congress Party after its vertical split.
The NDA's combined parliamentary and state-level committed Presidential votes number around 12,000 fewer than a majority.
A day-long bandh called by United Andhra supporters, including Telugu Desam Party and YSR Congress, against draft Telangana Bill hit essential services in coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema districts on Friday, inconveniencing several citizens.
'I was never interested to work as Leader of Opposition but accepted the role on demand of the party MLAs'
Hyderabad, which would be the joint capital of Telangana and the Andhra region for 10 years, could be modelled after Delhi where law and order is handled by the Centre, Congress leader Digvijay Singh has said.
Former Union Minister and senior Congress leader Renuka Chowdhury was on Thursday seen in a video purportedly grabbing the collar of an on-duty police official during a protest called by her party, the act forcing the police to slap a case against her.
Prime minister Manmohan Singh and several Congress leaders are against the formation of a separate state but are supporting the decision in the hope that it would win the party seats in the region. Renu Mittal reports
'If he has not achieved 'Congress mukt Bharat' even now, the question of his creating a 'DMK mukt Tamil Nadu' does not arise,' points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Sukanta Majumdar, the state BJP president, said, "Amit Shah has set a target of 35 seats. We will achieve that".
Excluding the Bharatiya Janata Party, which ardently opposed the bill both inside and outside the assembly, the entire Opposition supported the Backward Class, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Reservation Bill, 2017, which will be now debated and passed by the state legislative council.
Ministers and Congress MLAs from Rayalaseema raised a demand that the new capital of Andhra Pradesh be located in Rayalaseema region, implying Kurnool town.
Voting will be held on Thursday in bypolls to seven assembly seats in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
In an apparent attempt to cosy up with the Congress, the Shiv Sena has cautioned the Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party government against preparing to win the next trust vote by suspending Congress legislators.
Braving attacks by pro-Telangana elements, nearly one lakh employees from coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions congregated in Hyderabad on Saturday for a rally, which gave the call to keep the state united.
The HC noted that there is no reasonable ground to stay the conviction.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's bypoll win in four of the six seats it contested has invigorated the party ahead of assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
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'.
All 41 candidates from Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Telangana were elected unopposed on Friday after the biennial elections to 57 Rajya Sabha seats were announced recently.
"I am ready to die to keep the state united, as I consider the decision of the Congress to be a very bad one. If the Bill is tabled in Parliament, there will be a self-immolation and I am very serious about it," Ankapalli MP Sabbam Hari tells Vicky Nanjappa.
As the Congress and United Progressive Alliance government appear to be veering towards formation of a separate Telangana state, ministers and MPs from Andhra and Rayalaseema regions met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Saturday opposing any division of Andhra Pradesh.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday assured her counterpart from Delhi Arvind Kejriwal, that her party would support him in his fight against the central ordinance to control appointments and transfer of bureaucrats.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday won four seats in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Odisha, while the Rashtriya Janata Dal retained the Mokama assembly seat in the bypolls to seven assembly constituencies in six states.
Among the seven seats which witnessed a stiff contest between the BJP and the regional parties, the saffron party held three and the Congress two, while the Shiv Sena and the RJD had one each.
Voting began on Thursday in the by-election to seven assembly constituencies in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
While the BJP and the Congress have always supported the bill, opposition by other parties and demands from some for quota for backward classes within the women's quota have been key sticking points.
In a sharp defiance of Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi, Congress MPs and legislators from the two hill districts of Assam -- Karbi Anglong and Dima Hasao -- have taken an initiative to launch a forum to demand a separate state comprising two hill districts.
Pawar said even during the Emergency years there was a feeling in political circles that nothing would change for the next 25 years, but people ushered in change the very next year in 1977.
The Congress government in the Union Territory will have to prove its majority in the assembly on February 22 with Lt Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan on Thursday ordering the floor test, hours after assuming charge vowing to function in accordance with the Constitution.
It would certainly help if in the first five or ten years the new state had a Telangana United Front government which included all political parties and which then would dedicate itself to bringing about fast development for the neglected region, says Gautam Pingle in the final part of a two-part series on the new state.
Chief ministers and other senior leaders made last-minute appeals to voters for their support in Mokama and Gopalganj of Bihar, Adampur of Haryana, Manugoda of Telangana, Gola Gorakhnath of Uttar Pradesh and Dhamnagar of Odisha.
Though the wily TRS supremo, credited with achieving the separate state of Telangana, stopped short of saying he was about to declare dissolution of the assembly, none doubted its imminence.
The counting will begin at 8 am, and as per the Election Commission's COVID-19 guidelines, a candidate, his poll agent and counting agent can remain present in the counting hall, officials said, adding various measures have been taken to ensure social distancing and avoid crowding.
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