From the 'group of 23' leaders, who had written letter to Gandhi seeking Congress' overhaul, Azad and Sharma continue to be regular members of the CWC,
These include key constituencies held by Opposition parties such as Uttar Pradesh's Rae Bareli (Sonia Gandhi, Congress) and Mainpuri (Mulayam Singh Yadav, SP); Maharashtra's Baramati (Supriya Sule, Nationalist Congress Party); West Bengal's Jadhavpur (Mimi Chakraborty, TMC); Telangana's Mahabubnagar (Srinivas Reddy, TRS) and Madhya Pradesh's Chhindwara (Nakul Nath, Congress).
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Kirankumar Reddy on Tuesday dismissed as "rumour" reports that he has threatened to quit if the Congress gives its nod for formation of a separate Telangana.
The BJP leadership knows it can't boast of governance in the state as the Bommai government has little to show. So, the game plan is to project Modi, who will reiterate how important it is for a state to have the same party ruling in power at the Centre, observes Ramesh Menon.
Sibal, a prominent Opposition voice and a former Congress leader, also said that instead of a common minimum programme, the Opposition parties should talk about a 'new vision for India'.
Rahul Gandhi is marching with a positive thought, it is a positive yatra. There is no violence, no hatred. If you are not showing this yatra, you are not fulfilling your dut
Experts recommend awaiting the findings of the 2021 Census, which is yet to be conducted, before introducing population control policies.
However, the Telangana statehood was not even on the agenda of the assembly which reconvened on Thursday morning.
Sircilla Rajaiah's daughter-in-law and three grandsons were found charred to death at his residence under mysterious circumstances early Wednesday and hours later the leader, his wife and son were taken into police custody for questioning.
Facing the heat from their constituents as well as fellow legislators, Andhra Pradesh ministers hailing from Telangana region on Thursday came forward to resign from their posts but Chief Minister K Rosaiah prevented them from doing so.
K Chandrasekhar Rao deputed the party's working president and his son K T Rama Rao and other senior leaders to hold parleys with the leader of the opposition in Andhra Pradesh, Y S Jaganmohan Reddy, on Wednesday.
The youngest in the CWC is 31-year-old Neeraj Kundan, who is an ex-officio member of the body as the president of the National Students Union of India, the students' wing of the party.
'There is a need for a younger person at the top, but the old guard wants to grab the post themselves,' points out Amulya Ganguli.
The PM is seen as slipping up in confidence levels as aired by his 'exposure' of the BRS on a crucial issue as alliance negotiations, which is not done under normal circumstances, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
'The strategy of frontal organisations of the Maoists is to create unrest and ensure that such unrest leads to a law and order problem.' 'To cover such acts it was necessary to bring in a different definition of unlawful activities which is different from the definition of unlawful activities in the UAPA.'
He served as Union minister of information and broadcasting in the IK Gujral government and was allotted different portfolios in the Manmohan Singh government.
Gandhi, on the other hand, has also reached out directly to the party workers in the three states to know their top choice for the chief minister post through an internal mobile messaging app, party leaders said.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday joined the Bharat Jodo Yatra in Pandavapura, participating in a public event of the party after a long gap.
The Congress, who has presently become a "leaderless" party, has also been facing multiple shocks at the state levels.
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.
Even as the indefinite strike by the government employees in Seema-Andhra regions, opposing Telangana state completed 40 days with administration remaining completely paralysed, private educational institutions were also set to join the stir from Monday till month end.
The Bharatiya Janata Party replaced at least 25 sitting MPs with new faces as the party released its second list of 72 candidates for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls on Wednesday.
The polling started at 7 am and would continue till 5 pm.
It will now take at least two more years to get a clarity on the priorities and policies of the leadership of the new state of Telangana.
Amid continuing protests over the creation of a separate Telangana state, Union ministers from the Seema-Andhra region met Congress President Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi and expressed the "sense of deprivation" prevailing in Andhra and Rayalseema regions.
The chief minister's statement is significant as several non-Bharatiya Janata Party parties are trying to forge unity in a bid to form a grand alliance to take on the ruling party in the Lok Sabha elections this year.
Disappointed and angry Congress members are likely to train their guns on Rahul Gandhi's team of advisors for inept handling of the 2014 Lok Sabha poll campaign, says Rediff.com contributor Anita Katyal
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'.
'There are no jobs, the economy is slowing down, but the BJP is more concerned with issues like triple talaq, anti-Romeo squads and the beef ban.'
The Congress party's only hope now lies in its desperate wish that an unstable conglomerate of non-BJP, non-Congress parties comes to power with its support and collapses within a couple of years by which time the party hopes to salvage whatever it can from the debris of 10 years of the UPA's incumbency, says Saroj Nagi.
While bifurcation is a painful issue for many, one must understand it is the way forward, Union Minister of State for Finance J D Seelam tells Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa.
Proceedings in Parliament were washed out for the second consecutive working on Tuesday as Opposition members created pandemonium on a host of issues including JPC report on 2G, Telangana, price rise and death of children in relief camps for Muzaffarnagar (Uttar Pradesh) riot victims.
In her letter to Congress President Sonia Gandhi three days ago, Kidwai said she was relinquishing charge as party general secretary and Mahila Congress chief as he felt that Rahul Gandhi should be given the necessary space to bring in younger leaders of his choice
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.
'It is not just about numbers. Sometimes coalitions and alliances have symbolic value.'
Mother and son refuse to go away despite indications blowing in the wind that their leadership is ringing the death knell of the party, observes Ramesh Menon.
He had alleged that 'Telangana police has set up a bogus ISIS site which is radicalising Muslim youths'.
Once the blue eyed boy of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy, the ex Director General of Police Dinesh Reddy is up in arms against the CM today.
On one hand, South Indian states have been complaining about denial of a proportionate portion of the sharable funds from the Centre, based on population. On the other hand, they stand to lose Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha seats that again are based on population, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
Congress members of Parliament from Seemandhra on Friday hit out at the party leadership for not allowing them to move a resolution at the AICC conclave against the Centre's decision to divide Andhra Pradesh.
