Even as there is a strong anti-incumbency mood in Punjab, the multi-cornered contest has made the 2017 assembly polls prediction more difficult.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday termed the cancellation of over 25,000 school jobs as 'gross injustice' and alleged that it was a ploy by the Bharatiya Janata Party to stop these job losers from being deployed in poll duty.
Trump, who has launched a slew of lawsuits in key states, but has not provided any evidence to back his claims of fraud, announced on Twitter on Tuesday that he has fired Christopher Krebs, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) at the Department of Homeland Security.
At a massive rally in Lucknow, the Bahujan Samaj Party supremo came down heavily on Mulayam Singh Yadav and his son -- Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh. Offering hope to the ruling coalition at the Centre she said that she is opposed to FDI in retail, but is willing to be convinced of its merits.
Yadav, who returned from the national capital on Thursday after a trip that lasted three days, asserted that there was "nothing new" in the summons, even as he alleged that the central agencies were acting as per the directions of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
The ministry of finance is likely to assume crude oil price to remain within $85 per barrel while estimating subsidies for the Interim Budget 2024-25 (FY25), to be presented on February 1. Brent crude prices moved up on Thursday, ending at $78.9 per barrel. Crude oil and cooking gas prices, which move in tandem, impact fertiliser and cooking gas subsidies, constituting 53 per cent of the government's total subsidies.
A senior JD-U leader said Lallan Singh has expressed his desire to give up the top party post.
Exit polls by various channels predicted a hung house in Meghalaya, a win for the NDPP backed by the BJP in Nagaland, the two states that went to polls on Monday, and seemed to oscillate between predicting a clean sweep for the BJP to a hung house in the state of Tripura, where a new party the Tipra Motha may emerge as a potential king-maker in the polls, held a week back.
Counting of votes will be held on Thursday for the Gujarat assembly elections which were held in two phases on December 1 and 5 across 33 districts of the Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled state.
The Election Commission sent a notice to Mangal Prabhat Lodha, the BJP's Mumbai chief. This is probably because a leading newspaper highlighted his utterances on its front page.
'It was my late husband Durga Soren (Hemant Soren's elder brother) who built the party and strengthened it.' 'It was due to his strengthening efforts that we have today a JMM government in the state.'
With most exit polls predicting a tight contest between the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party in the assembly polls in Karnataka, leaders of the two parties seem 'jittery' over the outcome, while the Janata Dal-Secular appears to be expecting a hung verdict, which would enable it to play a role in government formation.
In a state where thin margins and minor swings decide electoral outcomes, nothing can be left to chance, even for those relishing the cocooned life, observes Shyam G Memon.
The most important lesson is that you have to build your political proposition, and sell it yourself. You can't leave it to the courts, media, NGOs and civil society and expect them to play the role of the Opposition. That's precisely what Mr Modi's challengers have been doing and we know the results, notes Shekhar Gupta.
While arithmetic political stability is a reality, the end result of politics in Maharashtra is hard to predict.
Sarma said no NDA partner will enter into any alliance with either Congress or the Trinamool Congress after the results are declared on Thursday.
Experts foresee possible scenarios: A BRS government with less majority, a BRS government with BJP and AIMIM support, or a Congress government.
Factbox explaining how the voting system will work at the FIFA presidential election on Friday.
Analysts caution a non-BJP government is not an impossible scenario. In case of a Modi-led coalition, they advise investors to focus on discretionary consumption, select private banks and financials, RIL, housing, and IT.
In the Interim Budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that a high power committee would be set up to consider the challenges arising from 'fast population grown and demographic changes.' 'But who wants data? It pays to feed people's fears, insecurities and apprehensions. If such fears don't exist, they must be created,' her husband Parakala Prabhakar says in this fascinating excerpt from his book, The Crooked Timber of New India: Essays on a Republic in Crisis.
"I want to send you my good wishes that you prepare so much that you get a chance to bring a no-confidence again in 2023," he had said while replying in Lok Sabha to the no-confidence motion in 2019, ahead of the general elections.
Several pollsters have predicted that the Congress may have an edge in Karnataka, which is BJP's southern citadel, in a hung assembly with a couple of them even projecting that the grand old party may get a majority on its own.
Sarma, who heads the Bharatiya Janata Party-led North East Development Alliance (NEDA), met Sangma at a hotel in Guwahati on Tuesday night, they said.
By keeping the Sanatana Dharma row alive and adding the Ayodhya temple consecration scheduled for January 22 and adding the free darshan promise from four polled states to the entire country, the BJP may have a self-fulfilling concoction, predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
'To sustain our growth trajectory, we must continue to explore and capitalise on growth opportunities.'
'The EC seems to have killed the joy of elections by stretching it interminably.' 'Imagine watching Andhadhun in a six-hour format and you will get the point,' says Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
The ISI was taking no chances and wanted no repeat of Pulwama; it wanted to make it clear at a political level it was not involved with the revenge attack being planned, but was only giving India a friendly tip-off. A stunning excerpt from Ambassador Ajay Bisaria's Anger Management: The Troubled Diplomatic Relationship between India and Pakistan.
The ruling Democratic Party will retain majority control of the United States Senate as two of its candidates are projected to win their pivotal races against Republican rivals, in a major boost to President Joe Biden in the second half of his term, both for his legislative agenda and his ability to appoint judges and other key officials.
The Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies are well on the way to power in two north-eastern states, and is almost certain to be part of the ruling dispensation in the third.
Led by Olympic champion Neeraj Chopra, India will seek to showcase its ascendency as a sporting power at the Asian Games, which opens formally on Saturday after an unprecedented one-year delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
'Historically, equities have consistently outperformed debt, gold, property, and other assets over a reasonable period.'
According to the surveys, the Janata Dal-Secular could emerge as the kingmaker in the May 12 election.
The people of Delhi have made a hardcore honest and working Kejriwalji win, Sisodia said.
Several BJP leaders in the past have raised a demand for changing the name of the country from "India" to "Bharat".
Any move of the present government to appease the Marathas may boomerang. Eknath Shinde is a worried man with the agitation not having an easy solution, notes Ramesh Menon.
Rahul Gandhi succeeds his mother Sonia Gandhi, who remained in the post for 19 years.
Going by Himachal Pradesh's "riwaj", or tradition, it should be the Congress' turn to form the next government.
'Temperature and wind can be predicted more easily than rainfall.' 'Rainfall, as common experience suggests, is very spotty.' 'The last bit of physics required that tells us whether it is going to rain or not is very hard.' Professor Roddam Narasimha, the eminent scientist, explains the monsoon, climate change and global warming, in a fascinating conversation with Shivanand Kanavi.
Shankar Acharya gives ten predictions on key politico-economic developments in the world and ten for India.
In many ways, Shashi Tharoor pointed out, COVID-19 saved the country as the Narendra D Modi's entire legislative momentum was stalled by the urgent need to tackle the pandemic.
