The Bharatiya Janata Party on Friday alleged that the UPA-II government's performance at the end of its fourth anniversary has waned so much, that it "mirrored the rule" of last Mughal emperor Bahadur Shah Zafar.
Trinamool Congress chief and West Bengal Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday announced her decision to withdraw from the Congress-led ruling United Progressive Alliance.
Transcript of the political resolution adopted by the Bharatiya Janata Party in its national executive meeting in Panaji, Goa on Sunday.
Commenting on Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde's statement that coal block allocation scam would be soon forgotten, Shiv Sena on Sunday said he articulated 'attitude' of the United Progressive Alliance government.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Sonia Gandhi and party leader in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury have received invitations for the consecration ceremony of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya on January 22.
The UPA chairperson said that there would be an UPA-Left Coordination Committee meeting on May 18 and added that they 'are looking forward to exchanging views on everything'.
Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde on Saturday said the resignations of Union ministers Ashwani Kumar and Pawan Kumar Bansal would not pose any danger to the United Progressive Alliance government.
The former HRD minister said the Congress is changing the education system of the country under 'unwanted influence of Left ideology'.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh appears a natural choice as the prime ministerial candidate of the United Progressive Alliance in the next elections and it may be 'too early' for Rahul Gandhi, Nationalist Congress Party chief and a key UPA partner, Sharad Pawar has suggested.
The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha on Wednesday said they had no differences with the United Progressive Alliance and would contest the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls in alliance with UPA and its allies in Jharkhand. JMM MP from Giridih, Teklal Mahto, said, "We had contested the last election together and won 13 of the 14 Lok Sabha seats in the state. JMM would contest the forthcoming election with the UPA."
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which has been opposing the National Counterterrorism Centre, on Saturday accused the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government of failing to provide leadership in fighting terror and asked it to bring in a strong anti-terror law if it was serious on the issue.
Official said a CBI inquiry has been recommended against Aman Biradari for violation of various provisions of the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act.
At a time when Mamata Banerjee has created unease in Congress by not supporting its presidential candidate, the latest issue of Congress mouthpiece on Wednesday recalled that Pranab Mukherjee has won respect even in the opposition.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi Wednesday took the Congress to the cleaners over making the 2024 general elections about the protection of the Constitution, saying Indians voted on the plank only once when they threw out the Indira Gandhi government in 1977 after the Emergency.
As the United Progressive Alliance-II government completed two years in office, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday dubbed it the "most dishonest" government in the history of independent India and charged it with failing on fundamental issues of corruption and price rise.
The National Conference, which will head a coalition government with Congress in Jammu and Kashmir, is all set to join the United Progressive Alliance, Congress sources said on Friday. NC President Omar Abdullah, who will take oath as the new J and K chief minister on January five, has written to UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi expressing his party's desire to join the UPA. The NC has two members in the Lok Sabha.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) Politburo member Brinda Karat came down heavily on Trinamool Congress chief and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and some other UPA allies terming them as 'hyprocrites' on various issues, including the petrol price hike.
The BJP's strategy seem to be to wean away allies from the Congress, in Dravidian Tamil Nadu, and maybe later in UP, Bihar and elsewhere, though in slow doses, but without wooing them into a new alliance. The idea seems to be only to weaken the INDIA bloc from within -- and leaving it at that, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
The Supreme Court on Friday set aside the appointment of Justice (retd) Chandrashekaraiah as upa lokayukta of Karnataka on the ground that he was appointed by the government without consultation with the chief justice of Karnataka high court.
Smarting under the electoral debacle and arrest of party MP Kanimozhi, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on Sunday made a token presence at the second anniversary celebrations of UPA-II where none of its six Union ministers were present.
What the INDIA alliance needs is neither a counter to Modi's tall personality and undiminished charisma nor a counter-narrative to his Hindutva agenda, now centred on the Ayodhya temple consecration on January 22, argues N Sathiya Moorthy.
Lo and behold the UPA magic. The share of the poor, in whose name all subsidy is created by liberal bleeding hearts, has shrunk from a little under half to just about one-third, write Sonali Ranade and Shaelja Sharma
"The Mumbai terror attack seems to have hit the UPA government like a thunderbolt and enlightened its vision. The government that used to rubbish any nationalist suggestion to ensure national security by dealing firmly with the terrorists and their domestic harbingers has suddenly woken up and started speaking a new language," said an editorial in RSS mouthpiece Organiser.
However, economic growth in five years of the UPA and NDA cannot be compared because of the now complex back series data, reports Indivjal Dhasmana.
The economic slowdown in India preceded global meltdown due to stoppage of reforms by the UPA government, former union disinvestment minister Arun Shourie said.
The Left parties on Tuesday lashed out at the UPA government equating it with the previous NDA regime for reducing the EPF interest rate and demanded reconsideration of the decision.
Arun Jaitley on Thursday said the previous UPA regime's land law has had "disastrous impact" on India's national security.
"Our parliamentary board will meet within a week to decide on the matter," Soren said, when asked whether the party, which is part of the UPA, would support it in case of a trust vote.
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram on Monday said the high growth that Indian economy has logged in the first quarter of the current fiscal was on account of the UPA policies and the new government must give it the due credit.
Nationalist Congress Party leader Sharad Pawar on Thursday met Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and assured her of support to any candidate that the United Progressive Alliance puts forth. "I told her (Gandhi) that whoever UPA nominates, we will support," Pawar told reporters after his 30-minute meeting with the Congress chief to discuss the issue of Presidential election.
Hitting out at Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav for favouring a Third Front, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday dared him to first cut off ties with the United Progressive Alliance government, of which his party has been a "part and parcel". BJP spokesperson Rajiv Pratap Rudy claimed that Yadav is "showing a lot of desperation" about a Third Front, though he himself is supporting the "corrupt" UPA government.
Criticising the crisis-ridden UPA government, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and senior BJP leader LK Advani has said that the Congress-led dispensation was "in a state of paralysis".
There is nothing "fundamentally inconsistent" with a minority institution being an institution of national importance (INI), the Supreme Court said on Wednesday while hearing arguments on the vexed issue of minority status to Aligarh Muslim University (AMU).
Stepping up his attack on the ruling United Progressive Alliance coalition, Bharatiya Janata Party leader L K Advani said the "corrupt" government has brought "disgrace" to democracy.
Shiv Sena MP Shrikant Shinde on Tuesday tore into the Uddhav Thackeray faction for 'abandoning' Hindutva and Bal Thackeray's ideology and even recited the Hanuman Chalisa in Lok Sabha as his party opposed the no-confidence motion against the Modi government.
Mamata Banerjee's fate in the United Progressive Alliance hangs in the balance with the Trinamool Congress leader continuing to give a loud and clear message that her party is not going to vote for Pranab Mukherjee as the UPA's Presidential candidate.
"The Congress-led UPA government is committed towards one objective -- to destroy each and every Constitutional authority in the country for its own narrow political gain," BJP spokesman Prakash Javadekar told reporters in New Delhi.
Politically, the striking outcome of the first year of the UPA government is its increasing vulnerability, says Communist Party of India Marxist's General Secretary Prakash Karat
