Behind its high-decibel campaign, powered by well-organised party machinery, the BJP also appears to have made a slight departure from its 'next generation' approach to stay ahead of an aggressive Congress and enhance its prospects of securing a majority of seats.
Rajasthan is all set to vote on Saturday to elect members of a new assembly with the Bharatiya Janata Party aiming to unseat the ruling Congress, which is fighting hard to change the trend of alternate governments in the state.
Polling for 16 Rajya Sabha seats in four states will be held on Friday amid allegations of attempts at horse-trading by rival parties which have corralled their MLAs in hotels and scenic resorts, prompting the Election Commission to appoint special observers and order videography of the entire exercise.
'... dividing society not just on religious lines, but also creating rift in families and among brothers and sisters.'
Voting will be held on Thursday for the first phase of Gujarat Assembly elections in 89 seats spread across 19 districts in Saurashtra-Kutch and southern parts of the state where 788 candidates are in the fray.
A video released on Monday, the second in two days, shows the two leaders presenting a united front in the polls and exchanging notes on the Congress campaign.
In nearly 100 seats, the BJP stands almost no chance of winning. In 200 seats, it is a direct fight between the BJP and the Congress where the BJP has an upper hand. In 243 seats, the BJP is pitted against regional parties and it is not going to be easy. That is why 400 seats may end up as a pipe dream, states Ramesh Menon, author of Modi Demystified: The Making of a Prime Minister.
While Wadiyar, scion of the erstwhile Mysuru royal family, is making his political debut from the Mysore Lok Sabha segment, Lakshmana is state Congress spokesperson and Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's confidant.
Robert Romawia Royte of the Mizo National Front has declared assets of Rs 55 crore, owns a popular football club and has a fleet of luxury cars.
In both of these Hindi heartland states, the straight contest between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Congress.
Here is the lowdown of the each state and parties.
Noted lawyer and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Ram Jethmalani and Union Commerce Minister Anand Sharma were on Thursday elected in the Rajya Sabha polls in Rajasthan, while a Congress-supported Independent candidate was defeated.
The Delimitation Commission, mandated to redraw the assembly constituencies of Jammu and Kashmir, is set to submit its report to the government next week, sources said on Thursday.
A day after a Trinamool district president allegedly asked party men to attack the police with bombs and burn houses of Independent candidates, a TMC member of Parliament on Thursday asked party activists to "beat up Communist Party of India-Marxist workers with shoes".
'If you post on social media on an issue like power cuts in Tral, the police will come to your home and tell you to remove your social media post.' 'If you don't, then the local police threaten you that they will book you under PSA.' 'This is happening all the time in Kashmir.'
The independents also scored big in some seats.
Like other cities of Gujarat, voters of this bustling urban centre have been standing firmly behind the saffron party since the early 90s.
He said that his primary goal would be to strengthen the political momentum to replace the Congress government with BJP rule in the coming assembly polls in Karnataka.
Six decades and more later, we are now captives of our identities. Every poll is based on elaborate calculations of electability of candidates on the basis of their castes and other narrow definers. That, along with voter promiscuity, is what defines our political culture, which remains stubbornly resistant to any change, asserts Shreekant Sambrani.
The political crisis arose in Himachal Pradesh during the recently held polling for the Rajya Sabha elections as nine MLAs, including six Congress rebels and three independents, voted in favour of BJP candidate Harsh Mahajan.
The Aam Aadmi Party has sought the setting aside of Tuesday's election, alleging tampering of ballot papers, and fresh elections under the supervision of a retired high court judge.
The BJP bagged 1,989 of the 4,371 panchayat samiti seats while the Congress won 1,852 with almost all results of the four-phase local government polls being declared.
It's a different Srinagar from what Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf encountered 24 years ago. Tourists throng the Kashmir Valley post-Article 370, azaadi appears dead, and everyone says one man is responsible for this change, so what if his poster is nowhere to be seen.
According to the Election Commission of India, the code has evolved over the last 60 years to assume its present form.
Counting of votes is underway in assembly byelection to 58 seats in 11 states including Madhya Pradesh where the results will decide the fate of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government.
The biggest electoral upset in the state was witnessed in Anantnag with National Conference candidate and former high court judge Hasnain Masoodi defeating former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti.
The BJP won both the Rajya Sabha seats from Assam.
It is in power on its own only in three states -- Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh and Telangana -- with a big question mark on whether it can even stake claim to be head of the INDIA bloc.
A Trinamool Congress legislator on Sunday threatened to not support any bill tabled by the government in the West Bengal Assembly in the future and abstain from voting in the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls in the state if 'atrocities' on his loyalists allegedly by a rival faction continued, even as the Bharatiya Janata Party said the collapse of the Mamata Banerjee government was just a matter of time.
Prominent celebrity losers include national award-winning actor Suresh Gopi, comedian Dharmajan Bolgatty, actress Priyanka Anoop, actor-anchor Krishnakumar and television serial actor Vivek Gopan.
Accompanied by Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Chaudhary reached Uttar Pradesh assembly premises in the morning to file his nomination.
The ruling BJP is confident of bettering its 2017 performance, especially with the new UP party chief, Bhupendra Chaudhary, at the helm of affairs, reports Virendra Singh Rawat.
The Congress won three seats, Shiv Sena won two, while the Nationalist Congress Party, Bharatiya Janata Party and an Independent bagged one seat each.
Super Tuesday is an important phase of presidential primaries when the early contests are over, and voters from multiple states cast ballots in primaries timed to occur on the same date. Almost all the results were one-sided in favour of Trump except for Vermont, where the winning difference was about one per cent.
In a bid to nullify anti-incumbency sentiment, the ruling party dropped 45 MLAs including former chief minister Vijay Rupani.
'Today, according to the law, you can't even claim legal expenses when fighting a case as a non-executive director unless you are acquitted. Given how high legal expenses are, that alone is enough to scare anyone away.'
The Congress won nearly half of the 2,105 wards in the contest in the first local elections held in the state after the party came to power in Rajasthan last December.
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