Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati has warned the people against the "communal designs" of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Bharatiya Janata Party and urged them not to lose their cool in the run-up to the 2017 Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
The Uttar Pradesh government on Thursday slapped the Gangster's Act on mafia don-turned-Bahujan Samaj Party MP Dhananjay Singh who was arrested last week in connection with a double-murder committed in 2010.
The BJP has many ruthless leaders with super-sharp political minds. But none has all this and Yogi's charisma and personal ambition, observes Shekhar Gupta.
The BJP wants to win a state where it has been out of power for 15 years. The Congress wants to make its mark in a state where it has been a bit player for nearly 30 years. And the BSP wants to recapture power it lost 5 years ago.
Polling in Phase II of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections consists of 67 constituencies spread across 11 districts.
Several exit polls on Monday forecast a clear majority for the Bharatiya Janata Party in Uttar Pradesh and the Aam Aadmi Party in Punjab with some of them giving an edge to the saffron party in Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur.
Uttar Pradesh assembly session began on a stormy note on Wednesday as legislators raised anti-government slogans and two of them took off their shirts protesting over various issues.
The tragedy took a political hue with CM Yogi Adityanath suggesting the involvement of SP in 'such mischievous acts'.
2019 will be 'a match between the old caste politics and something new which we have not fully understood in UP,' says Aakar Patel.
Opposition parties on Tuesday asked the government to call an all-party meeting to resolve the current impasse in Parliament, while sticking to their demands for a discussion on Pegasus snooping issue and a Supreme Court-monitored probe into the matter.
On the eve of the final phase of the Uttar Pradesh elections, Rediff.com's Aslam Hunani reviews the political landscape in the epicentre and beyond.
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.
Gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari's brother alleged on Wednesday that inhuman treatment was given to him while being transferred to Banda jail from Punjab, saying it could have been better had he been shot dead at a road crossing.
Opposition parties demanded that all elections in the future be held through ballot papers.
A local sculptor has been roped in to carve out some 150 statues of 'Behenji' to be installed at election offices and other places by BSP candidates in the coming elections for campaigning purposes.
True, Azam Khan is being targeted rather disproportionately and also because of his Muslim identity. That must be protested and resisted. But to say that he is a big messiah, and his profit-making educational enterprise is an issue concerning all Muslims of India, is absolutely unjustified, assert Mohammad Sajjad and Md Mohammad Zeeshan Ahmad.
Unsure about having the numbers in the Rajya Sabha, the Congress, the Trinamool Congress and other parties have decided they will create awareness about the "divisive" nature of the proposed legislation, reports Archis Mohan.
The poll results will depend much on whether the caste and community coalition worked out by Akhilesh can withstand the onslaught of the Hindutva forces who have increased their efforts to polarise the electorate on communal lines.
Two men from her village have been arrested. National Security Act will be invoked against the accused.
Surjewala made the case for state-specific alliances while arguing for a larger coalition with like-minded parties in 'national interest'.
Former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Wednesday renewed her demand for splitting the state into four parts, besides creation of Gorkhaland and Vidarbha.
While the ruling BJP, riding on the Modi juggernaut, wants to break the 38-year jinx and retain its southern citadel, the Congress is seeking to wrest power to give the party much-needed elbow room and momentum to position itself as the main opposition player in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
It is the first party to do so.
Basic Education Minister Anupama Jaiswal's remarks came even as the ruling party's Dalit, OBC outreach programme faces criticism from opposition Bahujan Samaj Party and some BJP leaders, including MP Udit Raj.
In a stunning blow to the BJP on Wednesday, the party lost bypolls to all the three Lok Sabha seats it contested, including its bastion Gorakhpur, and Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh, besides Araria in Bihar.
A court in Canada has ordered the seizure of amounts collected by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) on behalf of Air India and the Airports Authority of India (AAI). Separate orders were passed on November 24 and December 21 on pleas by shareholders of Devas Multimedia Private Limited who have filed multiple petitions to enforce arbitration awards against the Indian government. According to a Devas spokesperson, more than $30 million has been seized to date under the IATA action.
Amid country-wide outrage over the incident, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath had on Wednesday formed a three-member SIT which was instructed to submit its report by October 14, according to officials.
The parties seem to have forgotten their two decade-old antagonism for a 'political revolution' which they hope would 'last long'.
Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who was already seen as a potential threat to Mayawati's "dalit vote bank" is all set to have a showdown with the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party on April 14 , the birth anniversary of the party's key Dalit icon Babasaheb Ambedkar in Ambedkarnagar
'These guys who are running away -- they are running away from all that the BJP stands for.'
UP now has 16 ministers, the maximum from any state, in an apparent bid to keep the Dalit and other backward class votebank content.
With nearly a million identified slums, UP urgently requires housing for the poor
RLD sources said that the party chief was "taken aback" by the SP's delay in announcing his name as the candidate for the Rajya Sabha elections.
Series of controversies related to Dalit issues have come at a time when the BJP has launched a massive campaign to win back Uttar Pradesh.
What provoked Ashok Gehlot's belligerence was Sachin Pilot's participation in the Bharat Jodo Yatra with Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi in Madhya Pradesh. Gehlot was also aware that Rajasthan assembly Speaker C P Joshi had met Rahul in Maharashtra.
Akhilesh said that the defeat of the Dalit candidate would cement his party's relations with Mayawati-led BSP.
'The 16th and 17th Lok Sabha and the 2017 assembly election show that Dalits and OBCs are moving towards the BJP.'
The notices were issued on a petition filed by Pal's wife Pooja Pal seeking a probe into the case by an independent agency.
The bypolls are termed as a 'rehearsal' for the 2019 Lok Sabha polls by CM Yogi Adityanath.
A full majority might be difficult, but Mayawati is in a commanding position this time.
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