Independence Day was celebrated across states and Union territories on Thursday, as several chief ministers announced job schemes while some others vowed their support for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's vision of a Viksit Bharat by 2047.
The BJP also wrote to the EC, urging it to postpone the date of counting as Sunday is a sacred day for Christians, and the entire day is devoted to church services throughout the state.
The Congress needs to reorganise itself at the grassroots, infuse younger blood, and have more boots on the ground. Just offering freebies is not the answer anymore. Leadership matters, asserts Ramesh Menon.
Till now, the maximum Bharat Ratnas were awarded in 1999 when four recipients were given the coveted award.
The Election Commission of India has set up more than 200 polling stations within housing societies in the urban areas of Uttar Pradesh to increase the voter turnout in the politically crucial state.
The decision is being seen as a balancing act in the faction-ridden party in the state.
Nayab Singh Saini on Wednesday staked claim to form the next government in Haryana, hours after he was unanimously elected as the leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party legislature party in the state.
The grand old party faces the onerous task of rebuilding its moribund organisation, which is struggling to overcome a leadership crisis and regain credibility with the voters.
After two and a half months of taking oath, MP Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has many challenges before him. The first is to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic, which has affected more than 10,000 people in the state. But The political challenges are even more daunting, reports Sandeep Kumar.
He said that due to unfortunate circumstances such a significant and impactful event of the freedom struggle could not find its place in history books.
In its first list for the upcoming assembly polls in Madhya Pradesh, the ruling BJP has focused on seats it lost in 2018 and some of them even in 2013, and has reposed faith in 14 candidates, including three former ministers, who lost last time.
Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh on Thursday claimed that contrary to the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh's "false propaganda" that the population of Muslim community was increasing in the country, the number of the minority community members vis-a-vis Hindus was fast declining, and added that he could prove it.
The video purportedly shows the accused asking the victim whether his name is Mohammed, besides demanding his Aadhaar card before repeatedly slapping him.
In one of the tweets, Khan, who is deputy secretary with the MP Public Works Department, had last week urged makers of The Kashmir Files to also make a film on the 'killings of large number of Muslims across several states' in India, and said members of this minority community are 'not insects, but citizens of the country'.
The Delhi BJP, however, rubbished the allegation and challenged AAP to name the MLAs and the people who contacted them with the offer.
On Thursday, Scindia told the guest teachers in the state, stating that he would be their 'shield and sword' if all promises in the party's manifesto were not fulfilled.
The prime minister made the charge at a rally in Ajmer just ahead of the announcement of assembly election dates for Rajasthan and four other states in November and December.
The counsel appearing for the poll panel told a bench headed by Chief Justice S A Bobde that Nath's petition has become infructuous as the campaigning has ended and the voting is on Tuesday.
Rashtriya Janata Dal president Lalu Prasad Yadav on Tuesday said he was in favour of extending reservation benefits to Muslims but emphasised that it should be based on social backwardness and 'not on the basis of religion'.
The BJP is faced with the crucial question of who will lead the party in the four impending state polls this year: In Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana.
Over 65 Union ministers are likely to take oath, going by the visual of the meeting Modi held with his likely council of ministers.
The film, which was released on May 5, has kicked up a political storm.
Priyanka Gandhi was earlier actively involved in key decision making in the party along with her mother and brother, including the selection of new chief ministers for Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh recently.
If this were a French farce, nobody would have batted an eyelid if the father of the groom and mother of the bride fell in love and wanted to marry. But here, some crude comedy is generated with a dash of melodrama, feels Deepa Gahlot.
The leaders of the Opposition INDIA bloc are meeting on Monday morning ostensibly to redraw their strategies to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led BJP both inside the Parliament and in the electoral arena.
The strategic move will also bolster the BJP's push to decimate Uddhav Thakceray-led party by depriving it of its pet Hindutva and ethnic sub-nationalism plank.
'The lack of a majority isn't the issue. He has enough in 240, especially as none of his allies can pull down his coalition.' 'That's why he's started as if this were just another, normal term. That pretence is vital for him.' 'The change for Modi 3.0 comes not from numbers, but from the new environment of contestation,' points out Shekhar Gupta.
'The space required for wild cheetah populations to thrive was grossly under-estimated.' 'Cheetahs, because of their social system and ecologically fragile nature, live at only 1 cheetah per 100 sq kms even in the best habitats of Africa.'
A banner describing senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi as the '2024 prime minister' has appeared outside the party office in Lucknow, days after the Samajwadi Party office put up a similar poster calling its party chief Akhilesh Yadav the country's 'future prime minister'.
'Never has this happened in the state's political history -- that every class of people is unhappy.'
In Punjab, farmers sat on railway tracks at many locations in 22 districts, including Amritsar, Ludhiana, Tarn Taran, Hoshiarpur, Firozpur, Fazilka, Sangrur, Mansa, Moga and Bathinda. Because of the disruption of train services, passengers experienced inconvenience.
Polling is scheduled in all 20 seats of Kerala, 14 of the 28 seats in Karnataka, 13 seats in Rajasthan, eight seats each in Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, six seats in Madhya Pradesh, five seats each in Assam and Bihar, three seats each in Chhattisgarh and West Bengal, and one seat each in Manipur, Tripura and Jammu and Kashmir.
That he hasn't done so yet, has continued to be active on the political street, in public debate and on social media, signals an important change. It will give his party hope. Maybe the achievement of reducing Mr Modi well below the majority mark will now motivate him to stay committed, observes Shekhar Gupta
The party has already denied tickets to 14 of the 49 legislators who had won last time.
In both of these Hindi heartland states, the straight contest between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Congress.
The Election Commission on Wednesday changed the date of polling for the Rajasthan assembly elections from November 23 to November 25 in view of demands for a change given "large-scale" weddings in the state that day.
All 13 candidates in the fray in Indore against Lalwani, who won by a potentially record margin votes, lost their security deposit, indicating they were clearly rejected by the voters. If a candidate gets fewer than one-sixth of the total valid votes cast in a constituency, his/her security deposit is seized by the EC.
Besides the picture of Akhilesh Yadav, the poster also carries the picture of party state spokesperson Fakhrul Hasan 'Chand', who earlier in July on the birthday of the SP chief had put up a similar banner outside the SP office.
Describing the unrest among party members as just the "tip of the iceberg," the report shed light on the underlying discontent within the BJP.
Chouhan paid tributes to former Union minister and Congress leader late Madhavrao Scindia on his birth anniversary. Madhavrao was father of Jyotiraditya Scindia, who is said to be at the centre at the current political drama in Madhya Pradesh.
