Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Monday held consultations giving further grist to the speculation mill over a possible reshuffle of the Union Cabinet. This is the fourth meeting of the two leaders in recent days amid indications that the reshuffle would take place any time this week. There has been no official word on when exactly the prime minister would carry out the exercise.
Citing evolving needs and aspirations of the citizens, he said that the civil service must adapt to contemporary challenges to remain relevant.
A major Indo-US agreement that provides for assistance by American civil aviation bodies to their Indian counterparts in modernising airports
Union Labour Minister and a prominent BJP leader from Delhi Sahib Singh Verma, however, said the subject of law and order will remain with the Centre.
Despite the Nationalist Congress Party upset with the new pecking order in the government, Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Monday steered clear of the controversy in the wake of his being relegated to the third position in the Union Cabinet.
Barring a few, such as Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu (74), Union Minister C R Patil (69) and Uttar Pradesh Finance Minister Suresh Khanna (71), most other ministers attending the WEF represent the next generation of India's politicians.
Tolerant Muslims can be counted on fingers. I think their number is not even in the thousands, the Union minister of state for law and justice said.
The Indian government has announced it will allocate space for a memorial to former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, following a request from Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge. The announcement comes after the Congress party criticized the government for not finding a location for Singh's cremation and memorial, calling it a deliberate insult. Singh, who served as Prime Minister from 2004 to 2014, passed away on Thursday at the age of 92.
The government on Thursday amended the controversial Lokpal Bill, de-inking it from the setting up of Lokayuktas in the states and transferring powers of sanction of prosecution against public servant to the ombudsman. The Union Cabinet accepted 14 of the 16 recommendations made by the Rajya Sabha Select Committee, which was set up in May last year amid sharp differences among political parties, because of which the legislation has been stuck in the Upper House.
This was decided at a meeting of the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Cheering the move, shares of Jet opened the day on a bullish note and further jumped 7.26 per cent to Rs 414.70 on the Bombay Stock Exchange.
P Chidambaram was on Tuesday made the finance minister as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh undertook a minor reshuffle in portfolios in the Union Cabinet, necessitated by the exit of Pranab Mukherjee in June. According to the announcement, Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde is the new home minister in place of Chidambaram.
The Union Cabinet approved the DMIC project outline on the eve of the visit of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Information and Broadcasting Minister P R Dasmunshi told reporters here.
On India, the chart showed that the country charged 52 per cent tariffs on the US "including currency manipulation and trade barriers," and America will now charge India "discounted reciprocal tariffs" of 26 per cent.
The ordinance did not come up at the Cabinet meeting.
In 2019, an all-party meeting was held in Delhi and it was attended by 19 political parties to discuss critical reforms in governance. One of the subjects of the discussions was simultaneous elections
Two vacancies of election commissioners have arisen following the resignation of Election Commissioner Arun Goel and Anup Chandra Pandey's retirement.
The BJP leadership too has rallied behind Vajpayee, saying he would remain the party's undisputed leader.
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved a proposal to increase reservation for women to 50 per cent in panchayats.
It will allow states to detain students in class 5 and class 8 if they fail in the year-end exam.
The government plans to come up with a contributory pension scheme for its employees who joined service after October 2002, and set up a National Tax Tribunal to speed up settlement of disputes.
The retirement age of doctors in some departments is 60 years and in some others, it is 62.
With Google announcing the milestone of Willow - a state-of-the-art quantum computing chip that can solve complex problems in under five minutes, a computation so complex it would have taken a supercomputer around 10 septillion (10^25) years to complete - tech experts believe this breakthrough could impact artificial intelligence (AI), particularly by making it more accessible to the masses. However, industry players caution that it may take several years for this innovation to become commercially viable.
The government on Sunday appointed former Niti Aayog vice chairman Arvind Panagariya as the Chairman of the 16th Finance Commission. Joint Secretary in the finance ministry Ritvik Ranjanam Pandey will be the secretary to the commission, the government said in a notification. "The President is pleased to constitute a Finance Commission with Dr Arvind Panagariya, former Vice-Chairman, NITI Aayog and Professor, Columbia University, as the Chairman. Members of the Commission will be notified separately," it said.
In a letter to the secretaries of the various ministries under the United progressive Alliance government, Union Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar has urged them to ensure that the websites of their respective ministries are updated, accessible and reader-friendly in terms of usability and design.The two-page letter by Chandrasekhar exhorts the secretaries to "take vigorous action to revise and enhance your department's websites".
Delhi will be brought under President's rule and the assembly will be kept under suspended animation, with the Union Cabinet on Saturday accepting the recommendation of Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung in this regard.
FHe is the only one among 17 ministers from the outgoing council of ministers who lost the Lok Sabha polls to be reappointed minister.
Election strategist-turned-politician Prashant Kishor has predicted that JD(U) president Nitish Kumar will contest the upcoming assembly polls in Bihar in alliance with the BJP but may switch sides later, with hopes for another term as the chief minister. Kishor, founder of the Jan Suraaj Party, also asserted that Kumar's popularity has declined and he is unlikely to win a fifth consecutive term. He challenged the BJP to declare Kumar as the chief ministerial candidate, arguing that they would struggle to win seats if they did so. Kishor also criticized Kumar's leadership, accusing him of being "physically tired and mentally retired" and of "bringing disrepute to Bihar" by touching Prime Minister Narendra Modi's feet. He said his new party will enter the fray to pull Bihar "out of the political rut" and that the state's much-touted prohibition policy is an example of the BJP's duplicity.
The inaugural Afro-Asian Games will be held in Hyderabad from October 24 to Novermber 1.
The Janata Dal-Secular, whose refusal to transfer power to the BJP led to President's rule being imposed in Karnataka, later offered support to the BJP.
A five-judge bench of the Supreme Court will consider review pleas challenging the October 2023 verdict that declined legal sanction to same-sex marriage. The review pleas will be heard in chambers on January 9, with Justice P S Narasimha being the only member of the original bench that delivered the verdict.
The Union Cabinet has been summoned for an unscheduled meeting Tuesday morning before the start of Parliament's day's sitting, strengthening speculation that the government may be pushed to tabling the Liberhan Commission report on Babri Masjid demolition.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had said earlier that the Cabinet would take a decision on the issue in a day or two.
Modi also met the construction workers who worked meticulously amid harsh conditions to complete the tunnel.
The G7 summit, to be held in the luxury resort of Borgo Egnazia in Italy's Apulia region from June 13 to 15, is likely to be dominated by the raging war in Ukraine and the conflict in Gaza.
The Ministry of Finance may seek the Union Cabinet's approval for the proposed 10 per cent stake sale in state-owned Coal India Ltd by the end of this month, a senior Coal Ministry official said
The ordinance will be tabled in the next session of the legislature, it said, adding that 27 posts were approved for the commission.
For the past one week, Modi has been holding in-person meetings with Union ministers apparently to take stock of the work done by the government in the last two years and to discuss various issues.
'Additionally, the significant employment multiplier will boost direct and indirect jobs of up to 1.1 million.'
