The Delhi high court on Monday refused to quash the proceedings against Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and other Aam Aadmi Party leaders in a defamation case over their remarks about alleged deletion of the names of 30 lakh voters belonging to some communities from electoral rolls in the national capital.
They said that as Congress MPs, they are concerned about the transparency and fairness of the election process for the president of the party.
Rijiju also hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, saying that his own party MPs "get uncomfortable" when he speaks in Parliament and are apprehensive that he will do "anap-shanap baatein" and the party will have to bear the consequences.
The proposed first constitutional amendment bill would deal with making provisions for holding Lok Sabha and state legislative assembly elections together.
The political parties including the People's Democratic Party, the National Conference, and the Congress had opposed this order.
Former chief justices of India, who have conveyed their views to a parliamentary committee on the bill proposing simultaneous polls, have endorsed the constitutionality of the 'one nation, one election' concept but have raised concerns over its various aspects, including the power given to the Election Commission, and offered suggestions.
Of the 87.54 crore electors in the first six phases of the Lok Sabha polls, as many as 57.77 crore voters turned up at the polling stations to cast their votes.
As Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal pitches for early assembly polls in Delhi, experts on Sunday said the city government may have to write to the Election Commission giving reasons behind the demand. The term of the Delhi assembly ends on February 23 next year and the polls are expected to be held sometime early February.
Taking serious note of the discrepancies, Chief Election Commissioner N Gopalaswami told a press conference in Bangalore that it has been decided to delete 33.48 lakh entries and add 9.27 lakh new ones. Gopalswami, who reviewed the electoral rolls and the state's preparedness to hold the polls along with Election Commissioners Naveen Chawla and S Y Quraishi, said work on revision of the rolls was not satisfactory.
The Election Commission refuses to tell how many people have voted in each phase.
Of the 76.41 crore eligible voters in the first five phases of the Lok Sabha polls, as many as 50.72 crore people have cast their vote, according to data shared by the Election Commission on Saturday.
The Election Commission will dispatch a team to Gujarat to probe allegations of "bogus voters" being included in the electoral rolls. A three-member Congress party delegation including Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee chief Siddharth Patel, leader of opposition Shakti Singh Goel and general secretary in charge of Gujarat, Sidharath Reddy on Friday called on the Election Commission, complaining against the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Narendra Modi government.
The Election Commission on Friday directed officials for a review of the deletions and additions in the electoral rolls of three assembly seats in Karnataka and ordered the suspension of two additional district election officials after allegations of 'electoral fraud' in the state.
AAP projects its affordable 'health model' as a success story. The BJP calls it a hoax.
Parties like the NC and Peoples Democratic Party claimed the administration has not addressed their main concern on whether ''outsiders'' ordinarily residing in J-K will be allowed to enroll as voters.
He also asked why anyone seeking to contest the Congress president's election should go to the PCC office to get the electoral roll as this does not even happen in a club election.
Shinde He said anyone can go anywhere, it is their personal choice, but people support those who work for them and think about their welfare.
"The open-ended nature of Section 6A has, with the passage time, become more prone to abuse due to the advent of forged documents to establish, inter-alia (among other things), wrong date of entry into Assam, inaccurate lineage, falsified government records created by corrupt officials, dishonest corroboration of the date of entry by other relatives so as to aid illegal immigrants who are otherwise not eligible under Section 6A by virtue of having entered into Assam after March 24,1971," he noted in a separate 127-page dissenting judgment.
EC has directed the state government to delete from the electoral rolls, the names of those persons against whom non-bailable warrants could not be executed for more than six months.
The opposition parties were demanding a division of votes as they had moved a motion to send the Bill to a select committee, which was rejected by voice vote.
Jammu and Kashmir is likely to get around 25 lakh additional voters including outsiders after the special summary revision of electoral rolls being held for the first time after the abrogation of Article 370, an official said on Wednesday.
A bill to link electoral rolls with the Aadhaar ecosystem to weed out duplication was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Trump is confident the US will eventually emerge the winner from whatever turmoil his policies cause, notes T T Ram Mohan.
The current situation in Kerala politics is perhaps best described as a case of the state's traditional two front politics now seeing a third front (the BJP) muscling in with the potential outcome being either a messy three front affair or a renewed endorsement of the two front pattern but with one of the old fronts compromised or quashed, observes Shyam G Menon.
Accusing the opposition for the presence of bogus voters in electoral rolls, the ruling Left Front in West Bengal Monday urged the visiting Election Commission observers to go for a thorough scrutiny and remove all fake names.
A high-level committee on Thursday recommended simultaneous elections for Lok Sabha and state assemblies as the first step followed by synchronised local body polls within 100 days.
Days after rules were issued allowing linkage of Aadhaar with voters list to weed out duplicate entries, the Election Commission has warned of 'severe' disciplinary action against electoral registration officers for any leakages of physical forms filled by electors to share their Aadhaar details.
The former India all-rounder and member of the 1983 World Cup-winning team's name appeared on the BCCI's Draft Electoral Rolls (on the BCCI's website) for the October 18 elections and Annual General Meeting as a representative of the Karnataka State Cricket Association, instead of KSCA secretary Santosh Menon.
BJP MP Nishikant Dubey has written to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla seeking initiation of breach of privilege proceedings against Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for making "blatant lies and vilification campaign" during his speech in the House. Dubey alleged that Gandhi used his parliamentary privilege to spread canards without authenticating his charges and distorted historical facts during his speech. Gandhi had claimed that mobile phones were not made in India but only assembled here, China has captured the Indian territory, and India had sent Foreign Minister S Jaishankar to the US to get an invite for Prime Minister Narendra Modi for US President Donald Trump's swearing-in ceremony. He also made allegations related to the electoral rolls for the Maharashtra Assembly polls and the law for the appointment of the elections commissioner. Dubey accused Gandhi of misusing the Constitution's Article 105, which accords privileges to parliamentarians for their comments made inside the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. He urged the Speaker to initiate proceedings against Gandhi, alleging that Parliament's records and proceedings are a testimony to his irresponsible attitude.
Eighteen distinct amendments to the Constitution and other statutes would be required for the implementation of the Kovind committee's recommendations on simultaneous elections, according to the panel's report accepted by the Union Cabinet on Wednesday.
The National Conference called the meeting after remarks related to the addition of voters in the revised rolls by the Union Territory's chief electoral officer Hirdesh Kumar raised hackles of the regional parties.
The Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Wednesday demanded the cancellation of the nomination of Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Suvendu Adhikari, who is pitted against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee from Nandigram, as his name also 'seems to appear' in the electoral roll of Haldia constituency.
The Election Commission on Friday issued instructions to Chief Electoral Officers of poll-bound states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Mizoram for allowing voting rights through postal ballots to all electors subjected to preventive detention.
"More voters were added in Maharashtra in five months between the Lok Sabha and assembly polls than in five years," the former Congress president said.
Jammu and Kashmir has been without an assembly since November 2018 when the then legislative assembly was dissolved by then Governor Satya Pal Malik after the People's Democratic Party-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition government fell apart earlier that year.
The panel may recommend amending at last five articles of the Constitution to enable holding of simultaneous polls in the country.
Responding to a question, Abdullah said elections can be held whenever the government wants.
'The Election Commission is in the process of updating electoral rolls.' 'Once that is done, the dates for elections will be announced by the ECI at an appropriate time.' 'What can be more democratic than this?'
The Congress party in India has alleged "serious and grave inconsistencies" in the data relating to the polling and counting processes for the recently concluded Maharashtra Assembly elections. The party has sought an in-person hearing from the Election Commission to present evidence of alleged discrepancies, including the arbitrary deletion and addition of voters and inexplicable increases in voting percentages. The Congress leaders claim these irregularities benefited the ruling BJP-led alliance, which won a decisive victory in the polls.
The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the proposal for 'one nation, one Election' as recommended by the Kovind panel, Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Wednesday.
