Voting for the bypolls in Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Tamil Nadu were held on Wednesday.
Scinida quit the Congress on Tuesday. He is an influential leader of Madhya Pradesh where 22 Congress MLAs, most of whom loyal to him, have resigned from the assembly in a bid to topple the Kamal Nath-led government.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Ramniwas Rawat on Monday took oath as a cabinet minister in Madhya Pradesh, as Chief Minister Mohan Yadav expanded his ministry nearly seven months after assuming office.
The Congress on Friday posted its second worst performance in Bihar's electoral history, managing to win only six of the over 50 seats it contested and losing deposits in most seats as its 'vote chori' pitch failed to make any impact on the ground.
Supporters danced to the beats of 'dhol' and waved party flags, creating a festive atmosphere.
The Congress has promised to introduce the 'Mahalaxmi Scheme' in the poll manifesto which will provide Rs 1 lakh annually to the poor to alleviate poverty.
'This Budget has a one-year agenda, which you can call the sprint, and the marathon is towards Viksit Bharat.'
Many in the party believe that as was the cases in Rajasthan, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and Chhattisgarh, the BJP leadership might put its bets on a "dark horse" among the newly-elected MLAs.
Ahead of the Madhya Pradesh elections, Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs from Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Maharashtra have arrived in Bhopal as part of the ruling party's programme wherein every legislator will be allotted one assembly seat each that they are supposed to visit to take stock of the ground situation, party leaders said.
Rai also asserted that the Congress will win the upcoming Assembly elections in all five states.
With the party fielding three Union ministers, besides four other MPs, as candidates in the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls, it may continue with the strategy in Rajasthan.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's first list of 24 candidates for Lok Sabha from Madhya Pradesh featured former chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, while Bhopal MP Pragya Singh Thakur was replaced by another candidate.
'Most pollution boards across the country have unused funds. There is practically no reason why pollution should not be a political priority.'
Chouhan's fate will be determined by the BJP central command's assessment of the implications of such a move ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
The Congress on Tuesday suffered a major upset in Himachal Pradesh at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Rajya Sabha elections which were marred by cross-voting in all the three states though it won three seats in Karnataka while the saffron party pocketed an extra seat in Uttar Pradesh.
'Elections in Madhya Pradesh have so far largely avoided freebies.' 'But this time both the Congress and BJP are making such announcements.'
He said the people of the state took a historic decision in 2003 by removing the government of "Mr Bantadhar", apparently referring to senior Congress leader and former chief minister Digvijaya Singh.
Police have registered a cheating case against an alleged bogus doctor, who had also served as Bharatiya Janata Party Jabalpur medical cell's co-convener, after a complaint that he worked in a government hospital in Jabalpur on a fake degree, officials said.
The 10 who put in their papers include nine Lok Sabha MPs, including Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar and Prahlad Patel, and the one Rajya Sabha member, officials said.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi reiterated his vote theft allegations and criticized the Election Commission for demanding an affidavit to support his claims. He alleged collusion between the EC and BJP to steal the Lok Sabha election and called for investigation into election irregularities.
Polling in Indore, where the Congress is out of race after its candidate withdrew his nomination, is scheduled on May 13.
Rahul Gandhi said that the ongoing Lok Sabha election is aimed at saving the country's Constitution.
The BJP has often highlighted the global recognition of his leadership and India's enhanced stature at the international level in its political discourse, an issue which is likely to rise in salience following the G20 meeting.
With the assembly election results throwing up surprises, most exit polls got the outcome in Chhattisgarh and the scale of the Bharatiya Janata Party's win in Madhya Pradesh wrong.
Congress general secretary Bhanwar Jitendra Singh on Tuesday said there is no truth in the speculation of senior party leader Kamal Nath joining the Bharatiya Janata Party and claimed such talks were a creation of the media and the saffron party.
The Congress' strength in the 230-member MP assembly came down to 65 after Shah's exit.
Chandrapuram Ponnusamy Radhakrishnan was sworn in as the 15th Vice President of India, succeeding Jagdeep Dhankhar.
Outgoing Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Tuesday said he will 'rather die' than asking something for himself from his party.
On the day of polling in the high-profile Chhindwara Lok Sabha seat in Madhya Pradesh on Friday, the city's mayor Vikram Ahake, who recently joined the Bharatiya Janata Party, urged people to vote for Congress' Nakul Nath.
The poll results show that the BJP has increased its base among the SC, ST communities in the state. However, the party's prominent tribal face and Union minister Faggan Singh Kulaste lost the election.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi, BJP chief J P Nadda and new party entrant Ashok Chavan and Union ministers Ashwini Vaishnaw and L Murugan were among the 41 candidates elected unopposed to Rajya Sabha on Tuesday while Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh will witness polling on February 27.
The Congress on Tuesday said it welcomes displaying the portrait of the Father of the Constitution in the House, but it could have been placed along with the photos of Mahatma Gandhi and Nehru.
'Bringing in Dr Mohan Yadav as the Yadav-OBC face from Ujjain as chief minister, and a scheduled tribe leader Jagdish Devda from Mandsaur district, and a Brahmin face Rajendra Shukla from Rewa, the BJP is making an attempt to put in place a new caste equation in the state keeping an eye on the general elections next year.'
In Telangana, the K Chandrashekhar Rao-led Bharat Rashtra Samithi has been in power since 10 years and in Mizoram, the MNF is in government.
Of these, 200 are fielded by the BJP, 196 by the Congress and the rest belong to other political parties.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday claimed that a 'systematic vote chori' method, evolved by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Election Commission to 'kill Indian democracy', will be deployed in the Bihar assembly polls as well.
Priti Kinnar, a transgender social worker, is set to contest the Bihar assembly elections from Bhorey seat on a Jan Suraaj ticket, challenging the incumbent Education Minister. Her entry into politics has sparked mixed reactions, with some seeing it as a potential boost for the transgender community and others questioning its impact on the election outcome.
Asked why Nath was not himself putting forth his side, Patwari said that the MP chief minister would speak at the right time. "What I said was on his behalf," he claimed.
These leaders joined the BJP in the presence of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav, state BJP president V D Sharma and former CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan at the party's state headquarters on Saturday morning.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and other UDF MPs protest the arrest of Catholic nuns in Chhattisgarh, alleging religious persecution by the BJP government and demanding their immediate release.
