The Left rewrote history in Kerala on Sunday by becoming the first government to get a second term in four decades but its fortunes fell to a historic low in West Bengal where it failed to bag even one seat, resulting in its complete decimation in a state it once ruled for over three decades.
Besides Defence Minister Singh (Lucknow), Minister of Women and Child Development Irani (Amethi), those in the fray are Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Kaushal Kishor (Mohanlalganj) and Minister of State of Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur).
The LDF was also leading in 10 out of the 14 district panchayats and 108 block panchayats of the total of 152, according to the State Election Commission figures.
Meanwhile, allegations and counter claims continued on polling day as well, with Chandy's son -- Chandy Oommen -- claiming that his father and their family had been hounded for over 20 years.
Soumya Santosh worked as a caregiver attending to an old woman at a house in the southern Israeli coastal city of Ashkelon.
Heatwave conditions are expected over northwest India during the next five days, with Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Delhi predicted to bear the maximum impact, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said on Thursday.
The cancellation of UGC-NET, amid the raging row over NEET, led to questions being raised over National Testing Agency's (NTA) capability to conduct exams of larger magnitude.
Who else do we know who meditated so with such impeccable timing (much of the Lok Sabha elections over and with only the last phase to go) and hordes for unsolicited defence of the grand meditation at public expense? asks Shyam G Menon.
The Met office has issued a "red" warning for Delhi, Haryana, Punjab and west Rajasthan, stressing the need for "extreme care for vulnerable people".
Pappu Yadav has been asserting that he will contest the seat he had won thrice in the 1990s, with the claim of "assurances" from Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi.
Asked how many seats INDIA bloc will get, Gandhi said, "Have you heard Sidhu Moose Wala's song '295'? So 295 (seats)."
The poll panel has convened a press conference at 4.30 pm.
'What the northern Indian states lack is responsive politics based on the principles of development, social justice and equality.' 'A cut-and-paste job cannot make up for such lethal deficiency,' observes says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Separately, the poll panel also issued a notice to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, asking him to respond to the complaints filed by the BJP against him and the main opposition party's senior leader Rahul Gandhi regarding their remarks.
Against the backdrop of Kerala's appetite for commonsense, it was assumed that this controversy would pass. Respect for rationalism and scientific outlook is strong in the state despite political forces gnawing at it for their own goals, observes Shyam G Menon.
In the five years in politics Priyanka Gandhi has undeniably emerged as a thorn in the BJP flesh, notes Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay. It is time that this thorn is twisted a wee bit more when the elections have become far more uncertain than what it was when the Election Commission announced the poll schedule.
'Union Budgets are often used as political instruments and that was the intention of this government too.' 'But while the exercise has settled two fronts, it has left open several others and this has the potential to aggravate with time,' predicts Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
'Samsung declared they would not allow the presence of any trade union.' 'This is unacceptable as the rule of law in India permits employees to have a trade union.' 'So, the crux of the strike is this.'
The party fielded Maneka Gandhi from Sultanpur, while Uttar Pradesh minister Jitin Prasada has replaced Varun Gandhi in Pilibhit.
Leaders of several Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) parties met on Saturday to take stock of the opposition's preparations leading up to the June 4 counting of votes polled in the Lok Sabha elections, and claimed they will get more than 295 seats, enough for them to form the next government.
Mamata Banerjee fended off a spirited challenge by a resurgent Bharatiya Janata Party in West Bengal with a landslide victory for her Trinamool Congress on Sunday for a third consecutive term and the saffron party and the Left Democratic Front were poised to form government again in Assam and Kerala respectively while the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam stormed back to power in Tamil Nadu after a gap of 10 years.
In the coming days, unless Modi tones down the communal spiel, it will be clear that anxiety continues to drive his mind and clouds his judgment, observes Modi biographer Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay.
Devaswoms are meant to manage temples, not the faithful. Why didn't they simply stick to their set of responsibilities and execute it well and efficiently?, asks Shyam G Menon.
'The second Covid wave spread due to the irresponsibility of the Election Commission of India and now they are committing the same mistake.'
Court documents show that the Kerala government, whose case was treated as the 'lead case' among all the petitions filed against Adani, made four allegations to convince the court to cancel the contract for the Thiruvanathapuram airport. The state's legal team couldn't substantiate most of these allegations with documentary proof and its self-defeating arguments in court failed to convince the judges to cancel the contract given to Adani. The battle for the Thiruvananthapuram airport between the Communist-led Kerala government, the Adani group and the Modi government over the past year hasn't had a dull moment since the proceedings began. Claims of a smoking gun turned out to be a damp squib, says Sai Manish.
Along with Modi, senior BJP leaders including Rajnath Singh, Amit Shah, Nitin Gadkari, Nirmala Sitharaman and S Jaishankar, all ministers in Modi 2.0 Cabinet, took oath as cabinet ministers at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. In all, 71 ministers were sworn-in along with Modi, taking the strength of the Union council to 72.
The Congress chief, however, said he was not expecting any cooperation from the prime minister and the BJP-led central government for the development of Wayanad and Kerala.
'There is one way to defeat the intention behind this directive: To patronise Muslim establishments that have been forced to identify themselves.' 'This is one opportunity for the Congress to show that the 'mohabbat ki dukaan' its leader talks about does exist.' 'Can Akhilesh Yadav, who has asked the court to take note of this directive, order his party members to do this?' asks Jyoti Punwani.
Vivek Ramaswamy, who dropped out of the race to win the Republican nomination for this November's US presidential election after polling a pathetic 8% in the Iowa caucus, has already begun schmoozing the famously amenable to flattery Donald J Trump.
The country has seen that "people are God" in elections, the PM said.
Creating a positive reform that does away with an official who constitutes a flawed aspect of Indian democracy will allow the BJP to rightfully claim this as one of its positive legacies, suggests Karan P Shah.
He said the Congress has already begun preparation for the Lok Sabha polls with the ongoing 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra' led by party leader Rahul Gandhi and his own visit to various places across the country.
Catch the latest election results as they emerge, LIVE!
Robert Vadra said he has tested positive after he came in contact with someone who was COVID positive.
Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Monday lashed out at Governor Arif Mohammed Khan for seeking resignation of vice chancellors of nine universities in the state.
Heatwave conditions have been prevailing in Odisha since April 15 and the Gangetic West Bengal since April 17, according to the MeT department.
More than 750 constituencies spread across four states and one union territory will go to the polls on Tuesday
If you have an appetite for crowds and the visual spectacle of many focused on one task or activity, a pooram will engage you, notes Shyam G Menon.
'We want to prove to the world that they will get the best code written from a small place like Wayanad.'
'In spite of all the sermonising from the political class, when they come in public, the ministers don't follow their own rules.' 'They don't mask.' 'If you look at the West Bengal election campaigning, if you look at the Assam election campaigning or if you look at Kerala election campaigning, they are not setting an example.'
