With two more phases to go in the Uttar Pradesh assembly polls, Chief Minister Mayawati is confident of returning to power. "We would do better than the 2007 elections," said a beaming 'Behenji' after she cast her vote in Lucknow in the fourth phase of the elections on Sunday.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's bypoll win in four of the six seats it contested has invigorated the party ahead of assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
Nishad party president Sanjay Nishad, who had demanded deputy chief minister post but settled with his nomination as an MLC, thanked the BJP on Monday and said his party will ensure the NDA's victory in next year's Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls.
If the BJP gets only 200 seats and wants to remain in power, Modi will have to make way -- either for a proxy of his choice, or for an internal rival, predicts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Mayawati appeared to be opting for a wait-and watch-policy till the Lok Sabha election results are announced on May 23.
'Unless she joins one of the coalitions, she has a bleak future.' 'The NDA option is suicidal, but INDIA could help her.'
BJP sources suggest that the upcoming elections will likely revolve around the renewed enthusiasm for the temple unless another theme with religious and nationalist undertones emerges.
The long-awaited, much hyped Samajwadi Party-Congress alliance in Uttar Pradesh is "99 per cent off" said a senior congress leader as the Congress is all set to release a list of 24 candidates in Uttar Pradesh in the absence of Mulayam Singh Yadav giving his nod to the alliance.
Akhilesh Yadav had won the Karhal assembly seat in the recently-held assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has fielded Union minister Piyush Goyal, as well as its senior leaders Anil Bonde and Dhananjay Mahadik for the upcoming Rajya Sabha elections to six seats from Maharashtra, and senior party leader Devendra Fadnavis asserted that all of them will win.
The alliance adopted a resolution to this effect and said its theme for the elections will be "Judega Bharat, Jeetega India, (India will unite, India will win)".
The opposition is likely to put up a joint candidate for the July 18 presidential election despite not having numbers on its side, and consultations in this regard have already begun.
The battle for Uttar Pradesh will now be fought by two Gujarat leaders for their respective parties, reports Saroj Nagi
Sources in the Congress Party have said that the Rashtriya Lok Dal leader is likely to be given the civil aviation portfolio and will contest 45 to 50 seats in western UP. Renu Mittal reports.
PM Modi's remarks at the rally at Akbarpur come amid a row in Karnataka where schools have stopped Muslim girls from attending classes while wearing hijab.
Hitting back at the Shiv Sena, Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party leader Devendra Fadnavis on Monday said the Uddhav Thackeray-led outfit's Hindutva is merely on paper and finds mention just in speeches, while it was his party men who faced bullets and lathis during the Ram Janmabhoomi movement.
'Uttar Pradesh, our largest state by population and the most powerful, is also the worst governed.'
Adityanath also recommended that all other SBSP members holding the rank of minister of state be removed immediately.
SP supremo Akhilesh Yadav termed it as a 'ghaatey ka sauda' (loss-making deal) for the saffron party.
The speculation gained strength after the sulking socialist leader Shivpal Yadav recently met Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath amid reports of strains in the SP-led alliance.
Law Minister Salman Khurshid on Sunday drew flak from the Opposition for his remarks on minorities sub-quota and alleged defiance of Election Commission with Bharatiya Janata Party demanding his sacking and accusing Congress of working on a well "scripted conspiracy" to "communalise" Uttar Pradesh polls.
"Owaisi is an old friend of mine. As far as I know, he was 'Kshatriya' (Hindu) earlier. He is a descendent of Lord Ram, not the one belonging to Iran," said Singh.
The BSP chief said she does not want to see any damage to the SP-BSP-RLD alliance.
All political parties were asked at the dinner meeting on Monday night to suggest names for the alliance and the same would be discussed and consensus would be arrived at during the deliberations.
The tragedy took a political hue with CM Yogi Adityanath suggesting the involvement of SP in 'such mischievous acts'.
It will be in Modi's interest to reinvent his party, read the writing on the wall that voters wrote, and move ahead. He has little choice now. The country is watching, asserts Ramesh Menon.
The PM is seen as slipping up in confidence levels as aired by his 'exposure' of the BRS on a crucial issue as alliance negotiations, which is not done under normal circumstances, observes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Bharatiya Janata Party President Amit Shah on Wednesday dubbed the Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party as "KASAB", adding yet another acronym in the Uttar Pradesh poll campaign, and said development will elude the state till "Kasab is laid to rest".
'He only promotes those leaders who will never show any resistance to him in future.'
Both the BJP and Congress understand that coalitions and alliances are not just about numbers, but have symbolic value.
Modi wants the BJP to gets an additional 10% of the vote share from what it won in 2019. Plans are afoot to get new faces to replace MPs with poor chances of winning. Sources say more than 100 MPs are like to be axed, notes Modi biographer Ramesh Menon.
While ruling out any alliance with Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Navnirman Sena for the Ferbruary 22 BMC polls, state BJP chief Chandrakant Patil said, "I realised that he is vocal about the rights of Maharashtrians and fights for them. Simultaneously, he does not want to spread hatred against non-Maharashtrians."
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati on Tuesday staged a statewide protest against the steep hike in petrol prices announced by the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance-l government.
Dealing a body blow to the ruling BJP, opposition parties emerged victorious in 11 out of 14 bypolls.
The strengthening of regional outfits may weaken the grand old party's chances of leading a joint opposition front for the 2019 general elections.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday attacked Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, saying he was selling big dreams to the people of Uttar Pradesh while the United Progressive Alliance at the Centre had failed to alleviate the sufferings of the poor.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday attacked Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, saying he was selling big dreams to the people of Uttar Pradesh while the United Progressive Alliance at the Centre had failed to alleviate the sufferings of the poor.
Even if the BJP gets 60, 70, or even 100 per cent of the votes in the seats where it scored more than 50 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, these will still add up to only 224 seats, argues Shekhar Gupta.
The ruling party is worried as the alliance represents over 50 per cent of the state's population, reports Virendra Singh Rawat.
The broad patterns tell us that to sweep UP, the BJP has to retain its voteshares of the past three elections. But to merely win it, the party can do so while losing some voteshare, and perhaps up to as much as 10 per cent, observes Aakar Patel.
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