Rakesh Tikait, the 51-year-old Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) leader from the hinterlands of Muzaffarnagar in western Uttar Pradesh, welcomed the support from international artistes and activists, including Rihanna and Greta Thunberg, but acknowledged he does not know them.
MPs from 10 Opposition parties on Thursday wrote a letter to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla saying that the situation at Ghazipur border was like that of India-Pakistan border and condition of farmers resembles prisoners in jail.
Revenge he will exact from a party he had led with great aplomb until the Gandhi siblings stepped in and, in order to show who was the boss, flung him aside, observes Virendra Kapoor.
The two leaders also discussed the special category status promised to the southern state.
The seat-share progression should worry the BJP. From the previous assembly polls of 2017, through the assembly segments in its favour in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and now in 2022, the BJP's seat-share has come down from a high 312 to 275 to 255. N Sathiya Moorthy reads the political tea leaves after the UP and Punjab election verdicts.
The four ministers -- Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa, Sukhbinder Singh Sarkaria, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and Charanjit Singh Channi -- and around two dozen legislators met in Chandigarh at the residence of Bajwa on Tuesday.
The parties also said that the decision has come in late and had the Modi government shed its 'arrogance earlier' and repealed the laws opposed by farmers, a number of precious lives lost during the nearly year-long agitation could have been saved.
Expressing her anguish over the pain of farmers, Badal, leader of the ruling BJP's erstwhile ally, said, "It is strange that farmers are spending nights in open during the chilling winters and even then their demands are falling on deaf ears."
"They should go wherever they want," Bihar Chief Minister and Janata Dal-United chief Nitish Kumar said on Thursday when asked of Prashant Kishor and Pavan Verma's repeated questions about the party's stand's on the newly enacted Citizenship Act.
JD-U MP Harivansh filed his nomination as the ruling NDA candidate to the Rajya Sabha deputy chairman's post and is likely to be elected, even as the Opposition is working to field a joint candidate against him to force a contest.
Even as there is a strong anti-incumbency mood in Punjab, the multi-cornered contest has made the 2017 assembly polls prediction more difficult.
The list, which was released by Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari, also included former AAP MLA Kapil Mishra and has 11 SC and four woman candidates.
How can highways be blocked perpetually, the Supreme Court wondered on Thursday while referring to road blockades by farmers protesting at Delhi borders against the three farm laws passed last year, and said it is the executive's duty to implement the law laid down by the court.
It was also the shortest speech by Sitharaman, who had delivered the longest speech last year. Her first Budget speech in July 2019 went on for around 137 minutes and in 2020, it went on for more than 160 minutes and was cut short after she felt unwell.
The prime minister may go for new faces with an eye on grooming younger leaders while also factoring in caste and regional balances
Sidhu said there would be no need for Amarinder to go for power cuts or to regulate the office timings if the state acts "in the right direction".
Modi should call an emergency Parliament session and repeal these acts, said the SAD chief, adding that people have the final say in a democracy.
The dinner was followed by a meeting in which nearly two dozen allies facilitated Prime Minister Modi.
The culture of freebies burdens coming generations with the huge bill for the flagrant abuse of power by preceding governments, points out Virendra Kapoor.
The Congress picked Charanjit Singh Channi as the next chief minister of Punjab, making him the first Dailt to hold the post in the state, a day after Amarinder Singh resigned following a bitter power tussle in the party.
The polls for 70-member assembly will be held on February 8 and results will be declared on February 11.
The series of meetings are being seen as an attempt by the Bharatiya Janata Party to reach out to allies who have either been criticising or expressing their dissent with the party and also to strengthen the National Democratic Alliance ahead of the Lok Sabha polls next year.
The minister also hoped that a resolution should be reached before the year ends and asserted that the Modi government is committed to address all genuine concerns of the farming community.
Parliament proceedings were adjourned for the day following disruptions by Opposition parties which raised slogans on the Pegasus snooping row and the farmers' issue by gathering in the Well of the House.
Law and order has worsened in Punjab which is on the decline economically and socially, making the state a fit case for bringing it under President's rule, former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said in Amritsar on Tuesday.
Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar has held a series of meetings with MPs and Union ministers from Punjab and Haryana and surrounding states, and virtual interactions with state agricultural ministers of all BJP-led National Democratic Alliance ruled states where he briefed them about the merits of the two bills, the sources said.
The SAD has been requesting the Centre not to introduce the three agriculture-related bills for the approval of Parliament until all reservations expressed by farmers' organisations, farmers and farm labourers are addressed, Badal said.
The two bills -- Farmer's Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, and the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 -- were passed by Lok Sabha on Thursday.
Kaur, the Union Minister of Food Processing Industries, is the only SAD representative in the Modi government.
The Congress, which is in the Opposition at the national level, has turned 'feeble and disintegrated', Shiv Sena mouthpiece Saamana said on Saturday, and suggested that all anti-Bharatiya Janata Party parties, including the Sena, should come together under the UPA banner to provide a formidable alternative.
If the BJP wants to recruit him, it needs to make the supreme sacrifice -- of rolling back the three farm laws, because without that, Amarinder Singh is unlikely to cross over.
Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Friday announced job for a member of the family of each farmer from the state who died during the agitation against the Centre's new farm laws.
Taking a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rahul asked how could he stand with the Akali Dal when he always talks about eliminating corruption.
"My department is being singled out publicly. I always regard him as my elder I always listen to him."
The leaders of some Sikh outfits and hardline groups were taken into preventive custody early Wednesday in apprehension of breach of peace after a call that the newly-appointed jathedars would address the community from the Akal Takht.
There is anti-incumbency in urban areas. Rural Punjab, the Akali base, will hold the key.
Didi embarks on her new mission: To unite the Opposition to take on Modi in the Lok Sabha elections of 2024, observes Payal Singh Mohanka.
Chandigarh police used water cannons to stop the protesters from going towards the chief minister's residence.
The Modi government's defeat on farm laws underlines the perils of governing an entire continent-sized, diverse and federal nation like the chief minister of a state, observes Shekhar Gupta.
It is hard to escape the feeling that solving the problems of 2020 and 2021 will require something special which at the moment is not on view, observes Aakar Patel.
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