Prime Minister Narendra Modi has boosted the representation of backward castes, dalits, tribals and women in his Council of Ministers in a big shake-up of his government with a focus on politically crucial states, including the all-important Uttar Pradesh.
The missive to the chief minister came as the MLAs were reportedly shepherded to Mumbai last night and kept in a five-star hotel to apparently prevent them from being poached for the June 11 biennial polls to four RS seats from the state.
Congress partly vehemently opposed the bill, calling it "anti people", "inhuman", "anti constitutional", "anti poor" and "draconian", and urged that it should not be passed for any reason and should be withdrawn by the government.
Jay Shah, son of Union Home Minister Amit Shah, will continue as BCCI secretary for his second consecutive term.
"It is natural that people cannot tolerate those who are growing. Vijayendra in no way at any moment has interfered (in administration). "As state vice president (BJP), he is doing his duty by travelling across the state to strengthen the party," Yediyurappa said in response to a question.
For the first time, non-upper castes are in a majority in the board, as the party continues with its outreach to traditionally weaker and backward sections of society.
There are two such seats in Tamil Nadu and one each in West Bengal, Assam, Maharashtra, Puducherry and Madhya Pradesh.
"I will work day and night to offer relief to the people in distress due to COVID or the recent floods. I will initiate all steps to improve the economic condition of the state in the coming days," he told reporters.
Ignoring the recommendation of the state unit to field Vijayendra for the June 3 biennial elections to seven seats of Karnataka Legislative Council, the party central leadership on Tuesday announced names of four candidates, hours before the deadline for filing of nominations ended.
Kumaraswamy also ruled out any differences among JD-S MLAs over cabinet berths and allocation of portfolios.
Yediyurappa termed these two years as 'trial by fire', pointing out that he had to run the administration without a cabinet in the initial days, followed by devastating floods and the challenge of COVID-19 management, among other issues.
After Rahul's Bharat Jodo Yatra began criss-crossing the Hindi heartland, BJP leaders have revived their attacks on 'dynasty politics' and 'family rule' in the Congress, points out N Sathiya Moorthy.
India has built two top-secret facilities in Karnataka to enrich uranium in pursuit of its hydrogen bomb dream.
Opposition parties on Sunday lashed out at the Bharatiya Janata Party after Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar and eight others were inducted into the Eknath Shinde-led Maharashtra government, saying the ruling party's 'washing machine' has resumed its operation to clean tainted leaders and it was an 'ED-facilitated power grab'.
Tuvarakere Bharatiya Janata Party MLA A S Jayaram (Masala Jayaram) on Thursday accusing his own party of 'betraying' him, threatened to quit it, if he is not appointed as the head of a 'better' board or corporation in the state, by the end of this month.
Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of farmer unions, has organised protests in different states on Friday to mark the first anniversary of the farmers' movement against three central farm laws.
The chief minister, who had on Wednesday expanded his new cabinet by inducting 29 ministers, had played it safe by and large retaining old faces, as 23 of them were Ministers in the previous Yediyurappa cabinet, while six were new.
'Deeply hurt by Modi's conspicuous silence for over a month-and-a-half since the outbreak of violence, people in Manipur came on the roads and crushed their radio sets to express their frustration and anger.' 'The fact that Modi's Mann Ki Baat did not have a single reference to the Manipur violence further accentuated this hurt and anger.'
The reshuffle had politics at its heart, so the biggest complement of new ministers, both Cabinet rank and below, came from UP, which will see assembly elections in a few months.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Amit Shah (Home Minister) and our national President J P Nadda have a special love and faith towards me. You are aware that no position has been given to those who have crossed 75 years of age, but appreciating my work they have given me an opportunity despite me crossing 78 years," Yediyurappa said.
He also said the expansion of his cabinet would take place once state Congress leaders get an approval from their high command.
The Modi-Shah duo are standing with B S Yediyurappa: But B L Santhosh refuses to be silenced.
The educated, respectable and established Muslims voices, that were on the modernising side on the Shah Bano issue, are fighting on the opposite side now, mostly because they worry about Narendra Modi, observes Shekhar Gupta.
Union ministers Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal, Randeep Surjewala and Jairam Ramesh of the Congress and Shiv Sena's Sanjay Raut were among the 16 candidates elected to the Rajya Sabha from four states where polling was held on Friday after tussle over cross voting and alleged breach of election rules delayed the counting by around eight hours in Maharashtra and Haryana.
Joshi, an MP from Dharwad Lok Sabha constituency, played a crucial role in the conduct of the recent Parliament session amid the pandemic in his capacity as the Parliamentary Affairs Minister.
The top court directed the Secretary of the Union water resources ministry to personally appear before it on May 14 with a draft of the Cauvery management scheme to implement its verdict on water sharing between four states including Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
With organisations like the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, which is a front of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, telling Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman they want OPS back, the government is in a bind, report Shiva Rajora and Aditi Phadnis.
Gandhi had recently alleged in London that the structures of Indian democracy are under "brutal attack" and there is a full-scale assault on the institutions of the country.
'You can walk wearing the hijab on the street, but not in a school.'
The counting of votes for the Rajya Sabha elections was delayed on Friday in Maharashtra and Haryana over alleged violation of rules, officials said.
'For the first time since I've been following Indian politics, one heard voters talking about India's role on the world stage and the fact that, due to Modi's leadership, India was once again a great power.'
With sulking Tourism Minister Anand Singh shutting down his MLA's office in Hospet in Vijayanagar district reportedly to show his displeasure over the portfolio allocation, Chief Minister Basavaraj S Bommai on Wednesday said he would speak to him.
The crisis staring at the 13-month old government after over a dozen MLAs of the ruling combine quit on Saturday deepened with two Ministers and Independent MLAs -- H Nagesh and R Shankar -- resigning from the ministry and withdrawing their support to the coalition.
After the Gujarat and Himachal elections and the municipal polls in Mumbai and Delhi, Karnataka, Rajasthan, MP and Chhattisgarh will elect new assemblies next year leading up to the Lok Sabha election in April-May 2024, points out Virendra Kapoor.
Given the dismal show of the Congress in the recently concluded assembly polls and the JMM eating into its vote bank, the possibility of Congress MLAs switching sides is not bleak, reports R Krishna Das.
The reset button that the Bharatiya Janata Party has pressed on governance in the wake of the Covid-19 wave, which also saw a major overhaul by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of his own Cabinet, continues as Vijay Rupani on Saturday became the fourth chief minister from the party to go.
The Centre advised nine states including Assam, Bihar, Telangana and Odisha to ramp up testing with special focus on containment zones, strictly implement containment plan, augment health infrastructure and ensure effective clinical management of COVID-19 cases.
The chief minister, who had tested positive for COVID on January 10, today resumed his day-to-day work from office, after recovery.
The new Council of Ministers comprises of 25 Cabinet ministers, nine Ministers of State (Independent Charge) and 24 Ministers of State (MoSes).
The withdrawal of support by the two MLAs to the government has dealt another blow to the coalition which is tottering on the brink of collapse after 13 MLAs of the combine resigned on Saturday.
