The BJP expelled Vinod Arya and his son from the party, a day after the leader's another son was arrested in the murder case of a woman receptionist at a resort in Uttarakhand's Pauri.
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami on Friday won the bypoll to the Champawat assembly seat defeating Congress' Nirmala Gahtori by a record margin of over 55,000 votes to retain his office.
Dhami, who is a two-time MLA from Khatima in Udham Singh Nagar district, replaces Tirath Singh Rawat who resigned on Friday night.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday named 14 candidates for the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls including former Union minister R P N Singh and Sudhanshu Trivedi -- the only outgoing MP renominated by the party.
Voting for the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu were held on Wednesday.
The cabinet of the new government led by Rekha Gupta balances representation of all major communities that propelled the Bharatiya Janata Party to power in Delhi with a massive majority after over 26 years.
The electoral exercise, the first since the Lok Sabha elections, will decide the fate of many veterans and some debutantes including Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu's wife Kamlesh Thakur.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's member of Parliament from Pauri Garhwal, Tirath Singh Rawat, will be the next chief minister of Uttarakhand.
Reacting to the results, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said that in the by-elections held on 13 seats in seven states, the people of the country have given their support to the INDIA bloc.
An average voter turnout of 20 per cent was recorded in the first four hours of voting in the bypolls to 15 assembly seats spread across Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Kerala and Uttarakhand on Wednesday amid an incident of stone pelting in a village in UP's Meerapur and allegations of police personnel deterring voters from casting their ballot.
Voting for by-elections to seven assembly constituencies of six states, including Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Kerala, Tripura, West Bengal, and Jharkhand, started on Tuesday at 7 am.
The legislature party meeting will be held on Friday in the presence of the central observers and party in-charge of Uttarakhand affairs Shyam Jaju.
The Congress on Tuesday suffered a major upset in Himachal Pradesh at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Rajya Sabha elections which were marred by cross-voting in all the three states though it won three seats in Karnataka while the saffron party pocketed an extra seat in Uttar Pradesh.
the simmering discontent deep in the two parties is likely to mar the prospects of some candidates, making the contest keen, reports Shishir Prashant.
As the virus ravaged rural areas, the state BJP figured out it was impossible to underplay or escape its impact on its political plans.
Dhami and his eight ministers were administered the oath by Uttarakhand Governor Lt Gen Gurmit Singh (retd).
The party has fielded Parvati Das for the by-election to the Bageshwar assembly seat in Uttarakhand and Lijinlal G for the Puthuppally assembly seat in Kerala.
In the given scenario, Doiwala MLA Trivendra Singh Rawat and Pithoragarh MLA Prakash Pant emerge as the two most favourites.
At least half a dozen names have begun doing the rounds as Dhami's likely replacement, including Chaubattakhal MLA Satpal Maharaj, Srinagar Garhwal MLA Dhan Singh Rawat, former chief minister Triveda Singh Rawat, who did not contest the polls this time, and Didihat legislator Bishan Singh Chufal.
A top Madhya Pradesh government official, however, said on Saturday that no such plan has been finalised.
The task for RS Rawat to enter the assembly might not be easy, especially with the ongoing situation arising out of Covid-19, lack of vaccines and allegations of poor hospital facilities, reports Shishir Prashant.
Nine Congress MLAs, most of them Bahuguna loyalists, rebelled against Harish Rawat and supported BJP's claim to form a government.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat were among the early voters to exercise their franchise as polling was underway on Wednesday for the state assembly elections.
Opposition parties on Friday alleged that Bharatiya Janata Party leaders displayed insensitivity in handing over a compensation cheque to the inconsolable mother of Captain Shubham Gupta, who was killed fighting terrorists in J-K, and lashed out at them for using the occasion as a 'photo-op'.
Her election to the post was a foregone conclusion as the main opposition Congress chose to stay out of contest.
Hours before the ceremony, Saini visited the Valmiki Bhawan and offered prayers at a gurdwara and the Mansa Devi temple in Panchkula.
rivals Congress, JMM and TMC and Samajwadi Party.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among the 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday while Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27.
While the opposition alliance is putting up a united front in Ghosi constituency in Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand's Dumri, Dhanpur and Boxanagar in Tripura and Uttarakhand's Bageshwar, its constituents are contesting against each other in Dhupguri in West Bengal and Puthuppally in Kerala.
No matter how smug they sound on the surface about the potential of the dissenters to disturb the proverbial applecart, the Congress and the BJP know that their electoral calculations are precariously hinged in a seemingly tight contest.
At 45, Dhami takes over as the youngest chief minister of Uttarakhand.
BJP leaders also say it will be a very difficult task before the new chief minister pleasing the 56 party MLAs, reports Shishir Prashant.
While Chouhan has emerged as a favourite to remain at the helm in MP despite the presence of some challengers, the leadership race is wide open in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, two states where the BJP has snatched power from the Congress.
The results for bypolls to seven assembly seats in six states will be declared on Friday in what is being seen as a major test for the opposition's Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance against the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance ahead of the polls in five states later this year and Lok Sabha elections in 2024.
The seven seats -- Bageshwar in Uttarakhand, Ghosi in Uttar Pradesh, Puthuppally in Kerala, Dhupguri in West Bengal, Dumri in Jharkhand, and Boxanagar and Dhanpur in Tripura -- went to poll on September 5.
By March 17 it would be clear on who will be anointed to the post.
The 58-year-old leader was administered the oath of office by Governor Mangubhai Patel.
With the strategy working in its favour, the BJP could be encouraged to undertake similar steps in states, including Karnataka, where elections are due next year, to counter factors that might work against it.
Yashpal Arya and his son, along with their supporters, joined the Congress in the presence of senior party leaders Harish Rawat, K C Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala in New Delhi.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday announced Prime Minister Narendra Modi will fight again from Varanasi in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections as it named 34 Union ministers in the first list of 195 candidates.
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