The saffron party which has a lot at stake in the last two phases of polling scheduled for March 4 and 8 has moved its war room to Varanasi, entrusting Union ministers and senior leaders with the task of strengthening the campaign with the prime minister in the vanguard.
'Sarkar jo bhi gana gaye, is bar sarkar paltegi'
If the BJP is set to return to power in UP, Uttarakhand, Manipur and even Goa, it is not because of the party's performance or the quality of governance. No. It is essentially Modi's popularity, observes Virendra Kapoor.
The ravines, which are sharp, steep mud hillocks, stretch over three states - Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh, once home to several dreaded dacoits have long been the subject of several projects and government schemes to make them agriculturally viable.
The BJP hopes to highlight the "insulting" Congress meme on social media that had described the PM as a 'chaiwala', reports Archis Mohan.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, party president Amit Shah and chief ministers of National Democratic Alliance-ruled States are at the ceremony.
Leaders from across the political spectrum criss-crossed the entire state to woo the voters but Mulayam mostly kept indoors.
Increasingly seen as the 'bellwether' for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the assembly election results will not only decide as to who will rule UP but show which way the wind is blowing ahead of the Lok Sabha elections two years hence.
The Lok Sabha election will be held in 7 phases, beginning on April 11, 2019 and ending on May 19, 2019.
The results for the bypolls in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Bihar, Telangana, Maharashtra, Punjab and Tripura were announced on Tuesday.
Muslim voters in Uttar Pradesh could have voted in significant numbers for the BJP, endorsing its stand on issues like women's rights.
The rejig may take place before the assembly election results for Assam, Kerala, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry.
Kickstarting his party's 'Mission 2022' with a 'rath yatra,' Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Tuesday hit out at the Bharatiya Janata Party, saying it has 'crushed farmers' and on return to power in Uttar Pradesh would 'crush the Constitution' as well.
Before the MCC came into effect, Modi was busy laying stones, cutting ribbons, and unveiling plaques across the country.
Miffed over being denied permission to hold a rally in Varanasi, Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate continued his attack against the Election Commission and accused them of being biased.
Modi and Shah can't afford to lose any of the 24 per cent Dalit vote of 2014, says Shekhar Gupta.
'At this moment, the Trinamool has an edge.'
There is little that Andreas Schmid, the Swiss-born chairman of Flughafen Zurich AG (Zurich Airport International AG), and Yogi Adityanath, chief minister of Uttar Pradesh (UP), could have in common. But Schmid, whose company is building the Noida airport in partnership with the UP government, finds himself on the same footing as the firebrand Hindutva leader who rules the state. Both hope the Rs 30,000-crore ($4 billion) project, hanging fire for 20 years, shows some progress when UP goes to the polls in 2022.
India needs to examine some way in which, assuming that there is either no vaccine or a delay in administering it to everyone, voting can be made safer, notes Aakar Patel.
He said it's an alliance between two families, one of which 'looted' the country and the other UP.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati on Friday ruled out extending any kind of support to the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance government in the event of the party coming to power after the Lok Sabha polls.
Petrol and diesel prices are likely to be hiked this week as oil companies prepare to pare losses accumulated from keeping rates steady for over four months in the run-up to assembly elections in five states, including UP, despite international oil prices jumping to a 13-year high of $140 per barrel. West Texas Intermediate crude futures, the US oil benchmark, rose to $130.50 per barrel on Sunday evening, its highest since July 2008, before retreating. The international benchmark, Brent crude, hit a high of $139.13 at one point overnight, also its highest since July 2008.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday visited Garhwa Ghat Ashram in Varanasi, which has considerable following among the backward castes, and paid tributes to former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri at his ancestral home.
The government is learnt to have described the Union Budget as an annual constitutional exercise covering the entire country and not just a few states.
Khushi Dubey, Hari Shankar Tiwari and Mata Prasad Pandey represent the resentment among Brahmins towards the Adityanath government. Radhika Ramaseshan reports.
Sixty-six former bureaucrats in a letter to President Ram Nath Kovind said that the 'polling body's independence, fairness, impartiality and efficiency are perceived to be compromised today'.
Bahujan Samaj Party supremo Mayawati on Friday said the Election Commission should take suo moto cognisance of the manner in which Bharatiya Janata Party prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi filed his nomination from Varanasi at the time when the sixth phase of polling was being held all over the country, including Uttar Pradesh.
On the one side there is a strong 'chowkidar', on the other, a line of tainted people, the prime minister said.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Thursday directed officials to speed up setting up of a commando training centre in Rampur and also form a skilled team of women commandos.
They alleged that while the two main political parties in the state -- the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Samajwadi Party -- have 'cheated' them, the other parties are 'ineffective'.
The decision to not screen the movie has been taken keeping in mind the law and order situation in the poll-bound state, he said.
India will either have to create a system in which certain geographical areas will wind up being permanent political outsiders at the Union level or it will have to create a system in which certain votes are weighted more heavily than others, observes Mihir S Sharma.
Akhilesh Yadav doesn't need Bollywood stars to power his campaign for the UP election when he has a charming campaigner like his missus.
Congress and SP tussle over 10 assembly seats in Amethi and Rae Bareli.
The high-voltage campaign for the February 4 assembly elections in Punjab came to an end on Thursday evening following hectic campaigning by various political parties.
The group led by Akhilesh Yadav is the Samajwadi Party and is entitled to use its name and reserved symbol bicycle, the three-member Election Commission headed by Nasim Zaidi said in its order.
Lalu and Rabri were keen that he marry during the traditional marriage season, but he asked them to give him more time to make his mark in politics.
Given the controversy over Uttar Pradesh's population control moves, Hemant Shivsaran/Rediff.com digs deep to find out how many children BJP MLAs in UP have.
As long as he enjoys the PM's blessings, the BJP president's position is safe.
After Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party took on the Election Commission, alleging that it was being biased, Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav dared the poll authority to bar him and accused it of failing to revoke its order against Azam Khan as he had spoken in favour of Muslims.
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