In a major boost to the party ahead of next year's Assembly polls, the Trinamool Congress on Tuesday scored a landslide victory in the Kolkata Municipal Corporation bagging 114 of the 144 wards, and also won 69 of the 91 civic bodies in districts across West Bengal.
A large voter turnout of more than 80 per cent despite sporadic incidents of violence and allegations of vote fraud on Thursday marked the second phase of West Bengal assembly polls.
Mamata Banerjee fended off a spirited challenge by a resurgent Bharatiya Janata Party in West Bengal with a landslide victory for her Trinamool Congress on Sunday for a third consecutive term and the saffron party and the Left Democratic Front were poised to form government again in Assam and Kerala respectively while the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam stormed back to power in Tamil Nadu after a gap of 10 years.
The trolling of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is wrong, the HM said.
Paes, having proved his mettle in tennis courts, now sought to champion the cause of common people as 'I have always wanted to serve the country in one way or the other'.
Alleging that the BJP-led Centre was pursuing 'vendetta politics', West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee appealed to the Union government to withdraw its order recalling Chief Secretary Alapan Bandopadhyay and allow the senior bureaucrat to work for people amid the COVID-19 crisis.
Jharkhand Mukti Morcha working president Hemant Soren was on Sunday sworn in as the 11th chief minister of Jharkhand at Morhabadi Ground in Ranchi. Governor Droupadi Murmu administered the oath of office and secrecy to Soren, in the presence of senior political leaders and chief ministers from across states.
Election will be held in 60 out of the total 294 seats in the first two phases of the eight-phased polls which is slated to stretch from March 27 to April 29. The date for the second phase of election is April 1.
Alva, 80, would file her nomination papers on Tuesday, July 19 which is the last date for filing nominations for the August 6 election.
The State Election Commission on Friday informed the Calcutta high court that it has requisitioned 822 companies of central forces for the July 8 panchayat polls in West Bengal.
The Congress should take the lead in resolving differences of opinion within the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) and show 'large-heartedness' in seat sharing to emerge as a viable alternative to the Bharatiya Janata Party in upcoming elections, according to some opposition leaders.
At a time 20-odd opposition parties, many of them regional rivals, joined forces over the Adani issue, Nationalist Congress Party supremo Sharad Pawar's open support for industrialist Gautam Adani has put a question mark on the durability of a non-Bharatiya Janata Party block in the run-up to the 2024 parliamentary elections.
The TMC, in total, bagged 75.02 per cent of the votes cast, whereas the BJP got some 14.48 per cent votes, in the four assembly segments.
In a major boost to the party ahead of next year's Assembly polls, the Trinamool Congress on Saturday scored a landslide victory in the newly formed Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation, bagging 37 of the 41 wards and winning all the 16 wards in Bally Municipalty under Howarah district.
She said the Centre is allowing demonetised notes in various sectors like railways, aviation, petroleum, etc but not for state government sectors.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday slammed Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for seeking en bloc voting by Muslims for the Trinamool Congress and said had his party made a similar appeal to Hindus, it would have been criticised and censured.
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra on Tuesday stirred a controversy by saying that she has every right as an individual to imagine Goddess Kali as a meat-eating and alcohol-accepting goddess, as every person has the right to worship god and goddess in his or her own way.
Stating that at least 16 people of different political parties have lost their lives in the post-poll violence in West Bengal, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday slammed the Bharatiya Janata Party, saying unable to digest defeat in the state elections they were sending central ministers to incite unrest in Kolkata.
The desertion by more than two-thirds of the Congress legislative party makes TMC, a newbie in Meghalaya, the principal opposition in the Northeastern state.
Gurung vowed to support the TMC in the 2021 Bengal assembly elections.
Samajwadi Party leader Mulayam Singh Yadav behaved entirely in character when he broke ranks with the Congress and backed the Bharatiya Janata Party in the monsoon session, says Aditi Phadnis
The remarks by the BJP leaders came as 17 opposition parties resolved to fight the 2024 Lok Sabha elections unitedly to defeat the saffron party and work with flexibility by setting aside their differences. They dubbed the planned alliance as "unholy and opportunistic".
The alliance -- Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) -- has resolved to save the character of the republic 'being severely assaulted in a systematic manner by the Bharatiya Janata Party' and safeguard the idea of India as enshrined in the Constitution.
Cracks were visible in the Opposition unity ahead of Tuesday's meeting convened by Congress to ramp up attack on demonetisation and alleged "personal corruption" of the prime minister, with Left parties and the Janata Dal-United unlikely to attend it.
As the Opposition held its first meeting on the Presidential polls and names of Farooq Abdullah and Gopalkrishna Gandhi also cropped up, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party reached out to several parties across the political spectrum to build a consensus choice with senior party leader and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh speaking to Sharad Pawar, Mallikarjun Kharge (Congress), Mamata Banerjee (Trinamool Congress), Akhilesh Yadav (Samajwadi Party) and Naveen Patnaik (Biju Janata Dal).
A formal invitation for the rally had been sent to Kishor, a senior TMC leader told PTI.
Among the notable absentees were Congress president Rahul Gandhi, West Bengal chief minister and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee, Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's M K Stalin, Telugu Desam Party chief K Chandrashekhar Rao, Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and Delhi chief minister and Aam Admi Party convenor Arvind Kejriwal.
The war of words between West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her Gujarat counterpart Narendra Modi hit a new low on Wednesday when the former called the BJP prime ministerial nominee a 'donkey'.
There was no immediate response from the Aam Aadmi Party over the matter.
Criticising the saffron party for "undermining democratic values" in the country, the chief minister said, "Democracy exists in Bengal but it is under threat in several other parts of the country."
Take a look at the famous faces who exercised their democratic right.
'Now that there is an election in the offing, she is repeating the same old promises. Does she think the people of Bengal are fools to fall for her lies?'
The BJP chief also sought to know whether the Congress wanted to protect the "illegal Bangldeshis".
The Trinamool Congress MP said he is unable to bear various incidents that are happening in West Bengal.
Other prominent candidates among the 904 in the fray are Union minister Anurag Thakur, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's nephew Abhishek Banerjee, RJD supremo Lalu Prasad's daughter Misa Bharti.
A basic outline and roadmap for Opposition unity are likely to be deliberated upon with the contentious issue of seat sharing and leadership questions to be avoided for now.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee sought Prime Minister Narendra Modi's intervention on Wednesday in the alleged "whimsical" functioning of the railways in sending Shramik Special trains to West Bengal and urged the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Centre not to pursue politics when the state is battling a dual crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic and trail of destruction left behind by Cyclone Amphan.
The Congress failed to win even a single seat in the polls.
Didi embarks on her new mission: To unite the Opposition to take on Modi in the Lok Sabha elections of 2024, observes Payal Singh Mohanka.
The Governor invited the 'attention' of Chief Minister Banerjee to the preamble of the Indian Constitution.
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