Voting for the second phase of Lok Sabha polls will be held on Friday for 88 seats in 13 states with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi seeking a second-straight term from Wayanad in Kerala.
The speculation was triggered after Shravan Kumar, a Bihar minister, who is also the Janata Dal-United's in-charge for UP, said there were 'demands' that the party boss enter the fray from the adjoining state.
The bypolls were conducted for two Assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh, one each in Meghalaya and Odisha and the Jalandhar Lok Sabha constituency in Punjab.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi would have got a tough fight in Varanasi had Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contested against him as Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) candidate, feel party workers from the temple town.
After last month's devastating debacle at the state assembly elections, Bhartiya Janata Party had now got down to rebuilding the party in Uttar Pradesh, where the party failed to even maintain its five year old tally of 52 , which plummeted to 48.
With the Bharatiya Janata Party governments in both states, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh on Thursday reached an agreement on the division of their assets and liabilities, pending since their partition 21 years ago.
No sooner than the campaign for the recently concluded 2007 state assembly elections started in Uttar Pradesh, two sons rose up from rival camps -- Rahul Gandhi, referred widely by both friends and foes as Congress 'yuvaraj' and Samajwadi Party pointsman Akhilesh Yadav, who was now awaiting his coronation as the state's youngest ever chief minister. Sharat Pradhan reports.
A MP said that the PM has made it clear that we have been given mandate to work hard but not to enjoy
Besides Defence Minister Singh (Lucknow), Minister of Women and Child Development Irani (Amethi), those in the fray are Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Kaushal Kishor (Mohanlalganj) and Minister of State of Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur).
'It is a fight for principles for him, where he shall be presenting his protest to the wrongdoings.'
Uttar Pradesh chief minister-designate Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday met Bharatiya Janata Party president JP Nadda to discuss the formation of government in the state.
While the BJP and the Congress have always supported the bill, opposition by other parties and demands from some for quota for backward classes within the women's quota have been key sticking points.
Maurya made the revelation while favouring the expeditious implementation of the UCC both in the country and the state.
'Yogi Adityanath is working for one caste only and suppressing the others,' Bihar Minister and NDA ally Mukesh Sahni tells M I Khan.
Murmu's vote share is now likely to go past 61 per cent, while it was earlier estimated to be around 50 per cent at the time of her nomination.
'This was all conspired to gain a hold on the Wrestling Federation of India and to attack the BJP and its ideology...This team of Rahul, the Congress keeps doing these things.'
Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav on Thursday said people of the country want change of power, but evaded a direct reply on whether his party would join an opposition alliance to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
'In Independent India's politics you will not find any leader of a political party who has not contested elections or not held a powerful post.' 'It was only Balasaheb who never contested elections or held a post.' On the occasion of Balasaheb Thackeray's 99th birth anniversary, close aide Subhash Desai recalls vignettes about the Shiv Sena founder.
Considering that the three assailants who shot Atiq Ahmed and his brother posed as journalists, the commission suggested the media "observe certain restraints while covering such incidents".
The Samajwadi Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party appeared to take early leads in Uttar Pradesh where counting of votes began after a seven-phased elections concluded on Saturday.
On Friday, former ministers Swami Prasad Maurya and Dharam Singh Saini, five BJP MLAs and one from the Apna Dal-Sonelal had crossed over to the Samajwadi Party.
The governor accepted the resignation and asked Kumar to continue as the caretaker chief minister till the new National Democratic Alliance government is sworn in.
Yet another election has gone up and Uttar Pradesh continues to elect candidates with criminal records. With 189 tainted MLAs, almost 50 per cent of the state assembly comprises criminals, reports Vicky Nanjappa.
With the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections drawing close, AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi will begin a three-day visit to Uttar Pradesh from Ayodhya starting September 7, his party said on Friday.
The Muslim Rashtriya Manch has decided to organise at least 50 meetings with minority community members in Uttar Pradesh ahead of the assembly polls next year.
Several political parties had approached the EC to postpone the polls in the state in view of Ravidas Jayanti on February 16.
Maurya resigned as the party's national general secretary on February 13, accusing the leadership of discriminating against him and not defending him over his controversial statements on the Ramcharitmanas and the Ayodhya temple consecration ceremony.
Following in Apple's footsteps, Alphabet - Google's parent company - is in advanced talks with Foxconn to manufacture Pixel smartphones in Tamil Nadu, an industrial state which will also double up as drone-manufacturing hub for the US tech giant soon. According to a state government release, officials from Google will soon visit Chennai to meet Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin to hold discussion on manufacturing of Google Pixel near Chennai.
Chaudhary also announced that if his party is voted into power in Uttar Pradesh, high court benches will be set up in western Uttar Pradesh, Bundelkhand and Purvanchal areas of the state.
'Undeniably, Modi's position has stabilised and he has staged a comeback of sorts from the weeks after the Lok Sabha results.' 'Coalition partners are likely to be more tolerant of Modi... The forthcoming elections in Delhi and Bihar will determine whether this continues or not.' 'To win Delhi and Bihar, Modi will have to work in conjunction with the RSS.' 'However, because of the 'truce' that has been worked out within the Sangh Parivar, Modi will have to be more consultative than he has been in the past ten years,' reveals Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav on Monday said that the country is witnessing 'politics of change' and called on the youth to make it successful.
In an exclusive interview with NDTV that was telecast on Thursday night, Mayawati said she liked to wear pink because she wants to see pinkish smiles on the faces of the Dalit community, which had been suffering for a long time.
Voting will be held on Thursday in bypolls to seven assembly seats in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
The Congress on Wednesday cancelled its four marathon races listed this week and also decided not to hold any big rallies in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh amid rising cases of the novel coronavirus infection.
SP president Akhilesh Yadav and ally RLD chief Jayant Chaudhary are unlikely to participate in the Yatra due to "preoccupation" with their party programmes, their party leaders said.
Police have launched a probe into the killing of former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique from different angles, including a possible contract killing, business rivalry or threat over a slum rehabilitation project, officials said on Sunday.
The BJP may win more seats in the February 5 assembly election, but not enough to trump AAP, notes Ramesh Menon.
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has said that after fulfilling Bharatiya Janata Party's poll promise on Ram Temple construction in Ayodhya, work has begun in Mathura and Vrindavan as well.
Three of the fence-sitters rule fairly large states Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Odisha that together send 63 members to Lok Sabha -- where the Congress or other opposition parties have been pushed to the margins.
Rahul Gandhi is not to be blamed if the Congress does not perform well in the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, whose results will be out on Tuesday, party leaders said on Saturday. "A leader creates an atmosphere. To convert that atmosphere into votes and seats is the responsibility of candidates and the organisation," All India Congress Committee general secretary in-charge for Uttar Pradesh Digvijay Singh said.
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