Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh posed questions for the prime minister ahead of his rallies in Karnataka.
The Congress has made it clear that this time if it supports the Samajwadi Party government, it will join it. Is this another recipe for disaster? Aditi Phadnis analyses
Trinamool Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party are contesting in all the 30 seats, while the Communist Party of India-Marxist is in the fray in 15 and its alliance partners of Sanjukta Morcha the Congress and ISF are competing in 13 and two seats respectively.
At Thamnapokpi under Moirang constituency in Bishnupur district, armed men fired several rounds in the air near a polling booth prompting voters to flee, police said on Friday, adding additional security personnel were rushed to the spot to contain the situation.
Nearly 13.04 per cent voter turnout was recorded till 9 am on Wednesday in 43 assembly constituencies in Jharkhand where voting is underway in the first phase, officials said.
Karra, who became the J&K Congress chief last Friday replacing Vikar Rasool Wani, said a call is already there for all secular parties who are opposed to the "hegemonic attitude" of the BJP to unite.
Archana, a beauty pageant titleholder who won Miss Bikini India 2018, Miss Uttar Pradesh 2014 and Miss Cosmo World 2018, had joined the Congress party in November 2021.
The exit polls on Saturday predicted the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance winning most of the seats in Congress-ruled Karnataka in the Lok Sabha elections and the Congress not putting up a good show.
Officials said most of the preparations are complete and the counting will start at 8 am on Saturday.
Polling for the fourth phase of Uttar Pradesh assembly election covering 56 seats spread over 11 districts would be held on that would decide the fate of three ministers, 32 sitting MLAs and 12 former ministers.
A majority of over 50,000 internally displaced people are currently staying at relief centres across five valley districts and three hill districts.
This phase of voting was crucial for the state's ruling Samajwadi Party and main opposition Bahujan Samaj Party.
Gandhi said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the "champion of corruption".
Voting is being held at 11,860 polling stations spread over 11 assembly constituencies each in Murshidabad and Birbhum, six in Malda and seven in north Kolkata.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi once again led the BJP's campaign holding several rallies and stepping up his attack on Opposition parties, particularly the Congress.
State deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya among 692 candidates are contesting on 61 seats spread across 12 districts in the fifth phase.
Of the 788 candidates contesting 89 seats in the first phase of Gujarat Assembly polls, 211 are 'crorepatis', with the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party accounting for 79 such nominees, the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) said in a report on Thursday.
As evident from the first two phases, voter turnout will be low, thanks to the EC's strict measures.
The stage is set for the second phase of assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir which will seal the fate of 175 candidates, including the deputy speaker, four ministers and 11 other sitting MLAs, amidst tight security in Kulgam and Kupwara districts following the murder of a sarpanch by militants.
In Soraon, despite the tie-ups, Congress, SP, BJP and Apna Dal candidates are contesting against their allies.
However, in 950 booths, voting will end at 4 pm, though people standing in the queue at that time will be able to exercise their franchise.
The BSP has not entered into any alliances and has also been keen to shed the tag of being a 'B-team' of the BJP.
The polling will be held between 7 am and 2 pm in 34 constituencies -- 17 each in Kashmir and Jammu divisions. Besides DDC elections, polling will be held for panchayat bypolls in 50 vacant sarpanch seats and 216 vacant panch seats falling within the DDC constituencies, an official spokesman said.
Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar on Monday dared the opposition to share evidence of allegations that returning officers and district magistrates were influenced to vitiate the poll process so the panel could take action against them.
In violence-hit Manipur, the general buzz associated with elections and the related paraphernalia of posters, banners and rallies are missing but it is the presence of these brown boxes with pictures of guns that is symbolic of the strife-ridden society struggling to return to normalcy.
The identity of the informant shall be kept a secret, it said.
The state had recorded overall 79.80 per cent turnout in 2012.
Lok Sabha polls held over 5 phases so why hold assembly elections in single phase, asks Oppn.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party won the mayoral elections in 10 of the 17 municipal corporations in Uttar Pradesh, results for which were announced on Saturday, virtually adding a third engine to its "double-engine" government.
Seventy-one parliamentary constituencies spread across nine states voted in the fourth phase of Lok Sabha elections.
The incident comes amid accusations by the opposition BJP of "targeted killings" of its workers in the run up to the polls.
A direct contest between nominees of the BJP-led NDA and Congress-headed Grand Alliance is on the cards in 20 constituencies
Braving rainy and cold weather, and riding atop buses and trucks, officials carrying out Election Commission's task of holding the seven phase hustings in Uttar Pradesh have a thankless job.
Former Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, All India Congress Committee (AICC) general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and chief ministers of Congress-ruled states of Rajasthan, Punjab and Chhattisgarh are among those named by the party as its star campaigners in Uttar Pradesh.
The final phase saw voting in all 13 seats of Punjab and an equal number of seats in Uttar Pradesh, nine in West Bengal, eight seats each in Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, four in Himachal Pradesh, three in Jharkhand and the lone seat Chandigarh.
Jammu and Kashmir Bharatiya Janata Party chief Ravinder Raina is going to miss voting for his party in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections as the party has not fielded any candidate from his home town which falls in Anantnag-Rajouri parliamentary constituency.
The BJP got the benefit of a split in Muslim votes in some seats of western UP, and its candidates registered wins from Muzaffarnagar, Kairana, Meerut, Bulandshahr, Baghpat and Aligarh Lok Sabha seats.
A number of Assembly seats in the Parliamentary constituencies of former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee (in Lucknow), Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi (in Amethi) are also going to the polls.
While the polling so far has been peaceful, police had to open fire in the air in Purnia to disperse a crowd trying to disturb voting, even as people boycotted polling at 12 booths in Katihar in protest against barriers not being set up at two railway crossings.
The Election Commission of India has announced that the Delhi Assembly elections will be held on February 5, 2023, with the counting of votes scheduled for February 8. The last date to file nominations is January 17, and the scrutiny of nominations will be done by January 18. Candidates can withdraw their nominations until January 20.
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