The Congress needs to reorganise itself at the grassroots, infuse younger blood, and have more boots on the ground. Just offering freebies is not the answer anymore. Leadership matters, asserts Ramesh Menon.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party in poll-bound Karnataka on Friday sought to woo farmers, women and younger generation with a slew of welfare measures in its last budget in the current term, also earmarking Rs 1000 crore towards development and renovation of various temples and maths in the state.
The Congress, desperate to make a comeback in Gujarat, which has been ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party for over 20 years, has tried to reach out to various sections of society in its blueprint unveiled.
Environmental activist and educator Sonam Wangchuk accused the BJP of reneging on its promise of including Ladakh under the sixth schedule.
It is not unlikely that ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, the BJP government comes up with more imaginative schemes aimed at constituency-building. The party under Modi's leadership has a more modern thinking in such matters unlike its rivals, which are still steeped only in ideology, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
'UCC should be across India and legally applicable to every Indian citizen.'
Even before Boris Johnson stepped out of 10 Downing Street on Thursday to deliver his resignation speech as Conservative Party leader and triggering a leadership race for a new British prime minister, at least one Indian-origin candidate is already lined up to compete for the "best job in the world".
The party 'Mera Adhikar Rashtriya Dal' (MARD), registered in 2018, had unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections from Lucknow and Varanasi.
'When Fadnavis takes our help, it was sabka saath.' 'But when we support his rival, the latter is branded as appeasing Muslims.'
The prime minister says he will bring real change to Bengal. Perhaps he will. The interesting thing is that his party has never defined what this change is, observes Aakar Patel.
The saffron party promised a "direct payment of a proportionate bonus" to small and marginal farmers -- those owning up to five acres of land.
Rahul said his party's soon-to-be released manifesto will reflect the people's voice and not just one man's view.
'I do not want to get into the number game. This time, the BJP will get unprecedented seats and vote percentage in Gujarat.'
A day before her scheduled appearance before the Enforcement Directorate in the Delhi excise policy case, Bharat Rashtra Samiti leader K Kavitha led a hunger strike here on Friday seeking the passage of the long-pending Women's Reservation Bill in this Budget session of Parliament.
The National Alliance of Women's Organisations released the 'Womanifesto' for consideration of all political parties for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Kejriwal said the AAP would not have 'dreamt' of forming an alliance with the Congress but agreed to save the country.
His career as a bureaucrat has been somewhat colourless, which suggests his current elevation is simply a matter of being at the right place at the right time.
Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Wednesday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Samajwadi Party of talking about terrorism during the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections while diverting attention from the 'central discourse' on unemployment, inflation, empowering women and helping small businesses and farmers.
Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on Sunday said he was yet to receive minister T S Singh Deo's resignation from the panchayat department and that he learnt about the latter's move through media.
A general knowledge competition based on the 'Ramayana' will be organised at national and international levels, an official statement on Sunday said quoting the minister.
Gujarat voters, spoilt for choice, are eagerly waiting to see what the BJP will offer them.
As some BJP pollsters concede, the Modi leadership's sweeping success in elections 2019, especially across central India, owed not to Hindutva ideology, but to welfare schemes, all of them borrowed from Tamil Nadu, reveals N Sathiya Moorthy.
As Mallikarjun Kharge won the Congress president poll, his electoral rival Shashi Tharoor on Wednesday said the 'democratic contest' has galvanised vibrancy at all levels and has prompted a healthy and constructive discussion on change, which will serve the party in good stead in the future.
The CM said that his party will not 'abuse anyone'. He appealed to people to vote for AAP only if they think his govt has done good work. Single-phase elections in Delhi will take place on February 8.
Asha Singh, the mother of the rape survivor, said she is contesting the polls to ensure justice for the victims of such a heinous crime.
Seeking to woo Muslims as well as upper castes, the Samajwadi Party on Wednesday promised quota in police and other government jobs for minority community, release of "innocent" youths jailed on terror charges and constitution of an upper caste commission in its manifesto brimming with sops.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday assured that the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) will not be implemented in Assam if the party is voted to power in the state in the coming assembly poll.
Twenty years after the burning of a train in Godhra killed 59 'karsevaks' and triggered one of India's worst post-Partition riots, the poll-scape reflects the yawning gulf between the two communities.
Seven young students from different parts of the country had a wide-ranging discussion from bringing out Congress manifesto in Braille, setting up gender-neutral toilets to steps for removing inequalities in education system and caste discrimination in society with the Congress chief.
In Madhya Pradesh, the C-Voter poll projections gave the BJP 107 seats with a vote share of 41.5 per cent, against Congress' vote share of 42.3 per cent and a simple majority of 116 seats.
BJP chief J P Nadda on Thursday launched 'Lokkho Sonar Bangla' (target to build golden Bengal) manifesto crowdsourcing campaign to seek suggestions from more than two crore people in West Bengal ahead of the upcoming assembly elections.
"Karnataka has always forged inclusive economic development and we must not allow such communal exclusion- If ITBT became communal it would destroy our global leadership. @BSBommai please resolve this growing religious divide," Mazumdar-Shaw said.
A time has thus come when state encouragement for rural students led to empowerment of the socio-economically marginalised sections of the population. It included women. Today, with greater exposure and consequent enlightenment, it has gone beyond 'empowerment' to become 'entitlement', says N Sathiya Moorthy.
If purists are surprised as to why and how people are not demanding prohibition or not talking about past promises, both in the election manifestos five years back and even those made to the courts, the answer lies in how the state has been evolving and changing these past few years, says N Sathiya Moorthy.
There will be pressure on the fiscal situation, especially at a time when the monsoon can also disappoint. More populist expenditure is on cards if the mandate is a hung Parliament or a coalition government.
'Is baar vote jati par nahi, kaam par milega.'
'The Congress is unsure of emerging as the single largest party or group on May 16. In such a scenario, they do not wish to accord a loser tag to the young Gandhi... The Congress feels Rahul's projection as a prime ministerial nominee in 2014 would come in the way of the formation of an alternative, non-BJP government...' Rediff.com's Sheela Bhatt explains how the transition of power within the Congress is making the party vulnerable.
A Narendra Modi administration would believe more in decentralisation than would a Rahul Gandhi administration, says Arvind Panagariya.
More than a year after playing a key role in installation of a Bharatiya Janata Party government in Madhya Pradesh, Jyotiraditya Scindia was rewarded with a berth in the Union Cabinet, a familiar terrain for the Rajya Sabha member who had served as a junior minister in the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government.
The Congress won 77 seats or 42% of seats in the 2017 polls. How then can Gujarat be called a BJP bastion, asks Sanjeev Nayyar.
