Over 56 per cent turnout was recorded on Monday in 54 assembly seats, including in Varanasi, in the seventh and last phase of Uttar Pradesh polls, marking the end of the voting process spread over two months in the crucial state.
The submission was made before Justice U C Dhyani by advocate Amit Sibal, appearing for the Chief whip, who further argued that the nine were "paraded" before the governor to show the "new majority".
'There is a sense within the government and Modi that things are not as good as they were in 2019.'
The party president also said that India's self-confidence, pride and scale of ambition have grown manifold in three years.
The outcome is beyond the market's expectation and will be a sentimental boost, say analysts.
There will be no second term for President Kovind and no elevation for Vice President Naidu.
Ultimately, whether the UP ordinance is struck down by the courts or not, it will be the courage of young Hindu and Muslim women and men that will act as a foil to the UP police-cum-mobs who will be out to get them.
The results are being seen as a ringing endorsement of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's policies and a reflection of his unmatched popularity.
Former Nepalese foreign minister Ramesh Nath Pandey observed that the current situation is not encouraging for India-Nepal ties, saying the "present leaders" created irritants in the relationship in the past.
Informing about his decision, Maurya said in a tweet in Hindi, 'Due to the attitude of gross neglect towards Dalits, backwards, farmers, unemployed youth and small and medium-sized traders, I am resigning from the council of ministers of Yogi (Adityanath) of UP.'
Amit Shah's sustained campaigning against slaughterhouses has unnerved UP's leather and meat export industry.
Trains were set afire and blocked, and public vehicles attacked as protests over 'Agnipath' swept across several places in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi and Jammu on Thursday amid partisan political voices in favour and against the new recruitment scheme for the defence forces that has set off a firestorm.
The nodal officer for EVMs in Varanasi, a returning officer (RO) in Sonbhadra district and an additional election officer in Bareilly district have been pulled out from election duties, a day ahead of the counting of votes in UP.
Elections in Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan will see the BJP and Congress in direct contest.
Faceless Ambedkarite groups from across the country are running BSP's election war rooms, writes Archis Mohan.
UP is an important state to roll out the government's agrarian reforms and job growth policies.
BJP has won 34 out of the 69 seats, which went to polls, thus falling short of one seat from a clear majority.
Political analysts say that with 32 per cent vote share, the BJP would still be ahead of what BSP had polled in 2007 or SP in 2012.
Saharanpur recorded a turnout of 71.13 per cent, Bijnor 65.91, Moradabad 67.26, Sambhal 62.87, Rampur 64.26, Amroha 71.98, Budaun 59.24, Bareilly 61.67 and Shahjahanpur 59.34 per cent, a statement issued by the election office said in Lucknow on Tuesday.
The youth wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Assam on Monday claimed its activists have filed more than 1,000 complaints against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi at various police stations in the state over his tweets that left the Northeast out of India's geographical expanse while he talked about the country's unity.
Nandi had defeated, by a margin of more than 14,000 votes, Keshri Nath Tripathi who was a five-time MLA, and had served thrice as the Uttar Pradesh assembly speaker and was the BJP's state unit president at that time.
'This survey, done on the basis of feedback from BJP-RSS workers at the booth level, has given Narendra Modi the confidence to start packing his bags in Gandhinagar. on Tuesday, he has done photo shoots with his colleagues and staff.' Sheela Bhatt/Rediff.com presents the Sangh Parivar's assessment of how many seats the BJP will win in this election.
The Election Commission is confident of holding the five assembly polls due early next year, including in Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, on time as the poll panel has gained a lot of experience from the electoral exercise in Bihar, West Bengal and four other assemblies amid the coronavirus pandemic, Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra has asserted.
Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sarbananda Sonowal, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Narayan Rane, all of whom are being seen as probables for induction as ministers in the Modi government, arrived in the national capital on Tuesday amid indications that the Union Council of Ministers is likely to be expanded on Wednesday.
As CM, he took decisions that confirmed his image as a Hindutva mascot. Early in the first term, he banned illegal slaughterhouses and the state police cracked down on cow slaughter. But the menace of stray cattle created disquiet among farmers, presenting the Adityanath government with a new challenge.
There seems to be a desire for opacity when it comes to confronting China, points out Aakar Patel.
There is no record of Hridaynath Mangeshkar being sacked by the AIR, Raut said.
"The Congress ideology...the ideology it follows has been existing in India for thousands of years. Just like the RSS has its icons, the Congress has its own icons... they are different icons. But, we have them, it is about bringing this ideological ocean and allowing our people to swim in it," he said.
Digital canvassing is expected to benefit from political money looking for alternative blow horns.
The curtain came down on rumbustious electioneering over the last two months when assembly polls were also held in four other states - Goa, Uttarakhand, Punjab and Manipur.
'There are too many competent people better suited and poised to take on Modi. The Gandhis are not among them,' argues Harishchandra.
The assembly by-poll elections yielded good results for BJP allies.
'The present government swears by Hinduism. But we lost three of our sants during earlier BJP regimes.'
He asked BJP MPs/MLAs to take up various programmes, including spending 72 hours to reach out to people, when his government completes three years on May 26.
The Congress Working Committee, the party's top-decision making body, would soon meet to deliberate further on the Chintan Shivir plans, the sources said.
Newly-appointed UP Governor Aziz Qureshi's decision to throw open the gates of Lucknow Raj Bhavan to the common man has clearly irked ruling Samajwadi Party and staunch rival BJP. Sharat Pradhan reports
If 'development' and jobs and such things are less important to many than identity, then the BJP can dominate the discourse by stressing the largest marker of identity, which is religious nationalism, observes Aakar Patel.
The demand for minerals, boulders and sand is so great that it has fueled a black market and the goons who control this trade do not hesitate to kill law enforcement officers and reporters who have tried to expose them.
Legislative assembly elections in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state are due next year.
This came amid the buzz of an imminent reshuffle in the Union Cabinet.
