Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar was given the finance and planning portfolio on Friday, nearly two weeks after he broke away from the original party and took oath as Maharashtra's deputy chief minister.
Rising penetration of trade generic medicines is eating into the value growth of the domestic pharmaceutical market, showed a recent analysis. According to a Kotak Institutional Equities analysis, 70-110 basis points (bps) annual dent is expected from trade generics and Jan Aushadhi on Indian Pharma Market (IPM) growth at least until FY27-28 (see chart). Trade generic medicines are those that are not pushed into the market through doctor promotions.
The Election Commission is mulling issuing a notice to Bharatiya Janata Party leader Gopinath Munde on his statement that he had spent Rs 8 crore in the last Lok Sabha elections much above the prescribed ceiling as the Congress stepped up the demand for his disqualification as Member of Parliament.
Pramod's brother-in-law Gopinath Munde's statement has come as shot in the arm for the prosecutors in the case.
After targeting Union Minister Smriti Irani on her educational qualifications, the Congress has questioned Rural Development Minister Gopinath Munde on the same count, alleging that he "graduated in 1976 from a college established in 1978".
Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange on Thursday ended his nine-day-old indefinite fast, but warned of a bigger agitation if no action was taken in two months on giving reservation benefits to the community.
Tens of thousands of mourning supporters and distraught family members today bid a tearful farewell to Gopinath Munde, Maharashtra Bharatiya Janata Party's tallest mass leader and architect of its impressive victory in the Lok Sabha elections, who was killed in a car crash on Tuesday.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Gopinath Munde, who is sulking over certain decisions of the party leadership, on Tuesday ruled out quitting the party and said he has put across his 'grievances' to the party top brass.
He expressed confidence that the Maha Vikas Aghadi of the Shiv Sena-Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray, NCP (Sharad Pawar group) and Congress will come to power in Maharashtra after the 2024 elections.
Deputy leader of the opposition in Parliament Gopinath Munde told rediff.com he would seek the help of Right to Information Act to find out who was responsible for according the Padma Bhushan Award to non resident Indian hotelier Sant Singh Chatwal.
Among the keenly watched contests are those involving former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav (Kannauj, UP) and Union ministers Giriraj Singh (Begusarai, Bihar), Nityanand Rai (Ujiarpur, Bihar) and Raosaheb Danve (Jalna, Maharashtra).
Instead, senior Maharashtra leaders Eknath Khadse and Pandurang Phundkar will be representing him before the party high command in New Delhi. The BJP cancelled its daily briefing in Parliament on Monday. According to sources, the party expected media persons to raise questions about Munde's resignation.
"I received about 40 anonymous calls since Thursday evening. Some threatened to kill me while others wanted me to apologise to Pankaja," Sawant claimed.
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar was on Wednesday named as the guardian minister of his home district Pune in place of senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader and cabinet minister Chandrakant Patil.
The Bharatiya Janata Party had not yet given a thought to who would be its prime ministerial candidate for the next general elections, it said on Saturday.
The announcement of candidature of Bharatiya Janata Party general secretary Gopinath Munde's daughter Pankaja along with that of cousin Poonam Mahajan has met with severe criticism that BJP too is going the Congress way in following dynastic politics. However, the flak is the last thing on Pankaja's mind as she goes about campaigning for the October 13 Assembly poll from this constituency in Marathwada's hinterland.
Ajit Pawar was earlier sworn in as deputy chief minister in the Eknath Shinde government, while eight others, including Walse Patil and Bhujbal, were made ministers, the developments coming after a vertical split in the NCP.
"If it is a defeat, it has to be accepted by everybody," Shiv Sena leader and former Lok Sabha Speaker Manohar Joshi said when asked if the party conceded defeat in the elections.
Senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Gopinath Munde was detained on Monday night for the second time in a day, at the hill station of Lonavala, when he was proceeding to violence-hit Sangli-Miraj, party leaders said. Earlier in the day, the former state home minister was not allowed by authorities to board a flight to Sangli in western Maharashtra. He then proceeded to Sangli by road, but was stopped by the police at Lonavala, approximately 65 km from Pune.
The first sitting of the 16th Lok Sabha on Wednesday will be adjourned for the day after paying tributes to Union minister Gopinath Munde who died in a road mishap on Tuesday.
Bharatiya Janata Party general secretary Gopinath Munde on Thursday said rebellion in the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party alliance might work in favour of the saffron combine.
'If the Pawars are so powerful, then why are they scared of me?'
The situation is currently under control, Beed Superintendent of Police Nandkumar Thakur told PTI.
It was not a one-way ride up though for the man who now could potentially become the BJP's national president over time.
"If the Opposition (the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party) points out, with evidence, that norms have been flouted, we are ready to conduct an inquiry into the purchases," Fadnavis told PTI.
Any long dry spell could cause moisture stress in the standing crop during the crucial maturing stage and also make it prone to pest and disease attacks.
Trade generic drugs (medicines that are sold directly through distributors) are fast becoming a key segment for domestic pharma firms as volume growth slows in the overall market. Big companies like Cipla and Alkem have a significant presence in the segment but recently, players like Torrent Pharmaceuticals and Dr Reddy's Laboratories (DRL) have also entered this market. What is driving big pharma's focus on trade generics? The volume growth in the Indian Pharma Market (IPM) has come down from 5.6 per cent in FY16 to 0.1 per cent in FY23.
Out of the 24 NCP MLAs who attended the session, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar, cabinet ministers Chhagan Bhujbal, Dilip Walse Patil, Hasan Mushrif, Aditi Tatkare, Sanjay Bansode, Dhananjay Munde, Anil Patil and Dharmarao Atram were seated on the ruling side.
The veteran politician accused the BJP of breaking duly elected governments in opposition-ruled states even as it boasted about providing a stable government at the Centre.
Union Agriculture minister and NCP strongman Sharad Pawar filed his nomination for the presidentship of the Mumbai Cricket Association on Wednesday, a day after BJP leader Gopinath Munde did so, to make it a two-way fight at the October 18 biennial elections.
Barely days after imposing a 40 per cent export tax on onions to cool down soaring prices, which, in turn, triggered widespread protests across the main growing belts, the Centre on Tuesday sought to mitigate both political and economic tensions gripping parts of Maharashtra. It decided to procure an additional 200,000 tonnes of onions at Rs 2,410 per quintal for its buffer stock from farmers, a rate that is strikingly close to the price at which they were being exported before the 40 per cent duty was levied on August 19. The export price before the imposition of the duty stood at around $320 per tonne free on board (approximately Rs 2,650 per quintal).
'The cousins do not have a good rapport with each other in politics, though they may be having a good rapport with each other in family life.'
The decision was taken considering the complaints of harassment made against the woman by some leaders from the opposition, the BJP and the MNS.
Unofficially though, it is claimed that Ajit Pawar has the support of 29 MLAs, and the number could add up within two days.
Union Agriculture Minister Pawar, a former president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India and also the International Cricket Council, has shown interest in contesting the election, according to incumbent MCA president Ravi Savant.
The Assam government released full-page advertisements in newspapers claiming Bhimashankar as one of the 12 Jyotirlingas in the state, Mahesh Pathak, president of All India Tirth Purohit Mahasabha, told reporters in Mathura.
A group of Maratha reservation activists torched the first floor of the Majalgaon Municipal Council building and vandalised it in Maharashtra's Beed district, soon after setting on fire the residence of local NCP MLA Prakash Solanke on Monday, the police said.
Mayur Munde said the temple was his tribute to the PM who "built Ram temple at Ayodhya".
Former Maharashtra minister and Bharatiya Janata Party ally Sadabhau Khot on Thursday filed his nomination for the upcoming polls to 10 seats of the state legislative council as a BJP-backed independent candidate.
Even before NCP-Ajit Pawar leaders came to meet in Delhi, the central government decided to buy 200,000 tonnes of onions from farmers at Rs 24.1 per quintal. This was among the highest prices at which onions have ever been bought from farmers.
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