Famous clay modeller Mintu Pal is sculpting the fibreglass idol at his Kumartuli studio draping the 'deity' in the Trinamool Congress supremo's favourite white coloured tant saree and her trademark flip-flop slippers to boot.
"You are made to read lies, so please don't read it," BJP members said.
After being outwitted by the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party in the recent Rajya Sabha elections in Maharashtra, the ruling Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is now facing another challenge of getting all its six candidates elected to the state Legislative Council in the June 20 polls, which has once again put the spotlight on Independents and smaller parties.
In what analysts are terming as a political masterstroke, the ruling Biju Janata Dal President Naveen Patnaik Friday decided that his party will field candidates from Other Backward Castes (OBC) for 27 per cent of seats in the forthcoming three-tier panchayat elections in Odisha.
The police also claimed that the opposition BJP and the political opponents of Thackeray were trying to create an atmosphere to project him as anti-Hindu and not sponsoring the cause of Hinduism, and that in the present regime it was difficult for Hindus to practise their religion freely and thus the feeling of hate would increase against the Muslim religion causing a rift.
Thackeray was speaking virtually after the inauguration of a water taxi service, linking Navi Mumbai to south Mumbai, and the Belapur jetty in the neighbouring township.
The five accused allegedly poured petrol on Babu Lal Vaishnav and set him on fire in Bukna village on Wednesday. He was referred to the SMS hospital in Jaipur in a critical condition. Vaishnav succumbed to injuries on Thursday night.
The TMC had swept all the 16 assembly segments in Kolkata in the last election.
The government will not come down just because teh BJP are gossiping, state minister Nawab Malik said
The resolution is likely to be passed on the very first day of the session, government sources said. The opposition BJP has said the government's move to bring the resolution will be strongly opposed.
Sharad Pawar said it seems the party's decision to wait for the truth to come out after rape allegations were levelled against Munde was right.
Narendra Modi's speech had surprising omissions about his economics.
The BSE Sensex on Friday surged more than 6 percent to record highs while the rupee strengthened to an 11-month high against the dollar as the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies were set to sweep the country's elections with a clear majority.
The 30-share Sensex ended up 557 points at 23,551 after hitting an intra-day high of 23,572.88 and the 50-share Nifty ended up 155 points at 7,014 after touching an intra-day high of 7,020.05.
'The BJP has ordered the AIMIM to defame the Shiv Sena, to raise questions on Shiv Sena's Hindutva'
A meaningful long-run strategy to eradicate poverty would do more than a top-down distributive model.
The results in four assembly polls in India have given the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party the necessary momentum ahead of the general elections, but there is neither an indication of a 'Narendra Modi wave' nor a guarantee of a similar performance next year, experts based in United States have said.
Shiv Sena president and Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray on Friday reached out to the functionaries of his party, which is currently battling a rebellion, and sought to allay fears surrounding the survival of his political outfit and the Maha Vikas Aghadi government.
The Kamal Nath-led Congress government plunged into crisis after the resignations of 22 rebel MLAs of the ruling Congress earlier this month.
Amid criticism over the response of the Congress government in Uttarakhand to the devastation in the state, party president Sonia Gandhi on Monday flagged off relief supplies from the national capital. Party vice-president Rahul Gandhi, whose "absence" from the country when the disaster struck was questioned by Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, was present on the occasion.
The ordinance on sexual violence against women has evoked a mixed response with main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party welcoming it but Communist Party of India-Marxist and several women's groups opposed it, attacking the government for doing "injustice" to the Justice Verma Committee recommendations.
Congress leader Digvijay Singh on Monday took a dig at the Supreme Court over its observation that Central Bureau of Investigation was a "caged parrot," suggesting the description was "belittling" the country's institutions.
The Sensex is expected to hit 24,500 by the end of 2014.
The Rajasthan assembly on Tuesday witnessed pandemonium after the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party alleged that government had unduly favoured Sonia Gandhi's son-in-law Robert Vadra in land deals in the state.
Accusing the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party of weakening the country's democratic institutions, Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Sunday challenged the graft charges leveled against the government, and said that those who lecture on corruption, are themselves neck-deep in corruption.
The BJP had on Monday demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on moral grounds after his government said in a reply to a question in the state A assembly that it taps phones in the interest of public safety and order.
The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party on Saturday took a dig over the appointment of Bhaskar Jadhav as the new president of the Maharashtra unit of the Nationalist Congress Party, saying he had once given the party chief Sharad Pawar sleepless nights. "When Jadhav (then a state minister) had spent excessively during the wedding of his son, Pawar had said he could not sleep. Now, after appointing Jadhav, we wish Pawar a good sleep," state BJP chief Devendra Fadnavis quipped.
Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and Left parties on Friday slammed Oil Minister M Veerappa Moily for claiming to be under threat from oil import lobby, saying that the minister was concocting a story to help private firms gain from his proposal to raise natural gas prices.
A day after the announcement of election dates, the ruling Congress, opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and the new entrants, the Aam Aadmi Party turned up the heat as they went about making allegations and counter-allegations.
The Maharashtra Pollution Control Board has scheduled the hearing on January 15.
Members of Parliament belonging to the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on Monday exposed the chinks in the United Progressive Alliance's armour by getting question hour suspended in the Rajya Sabha with their demand to bring the Coalgate scam into focus
Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party and Left parties on Tuesday demanded separate debates with voting on Foreign Direct Investment in retail and related amendments in Foreign Exchange Management Act rules in Lok Sabha, but it was vociferously opposed by the government and rejected by Speaker Meira Kumar.
The debate boils down to what path India should take in coming years as slower growth puts further poverty reduction at risk in the world's second-most populous nation.
The MLAs, who are seemingly unhappy with their leadership, arrived in Surat on Monday night and are camping at the Le Meridian Hotel, they said.
The stalemate in Parliament over the Comptroller and Auditor General's report on coal block allocation continues.
The Centre on Friday ruled out sine die adjournment of Parliament before the last day of Budget Session and made a veiled attack on main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party for the disruption of House proceedings.
Time magazine has a long history of putting Indian leaders on its cover and many of them have created uproar in the country. Rediff.com looks back.
The ruling Congress and Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party are both set to hit the road and undertake 'yatras', aimed at garnering support among the masses for Assembly elections lined up in the state later this year.
Singh said in his plea before the high court that Deshmukh held meetings at his residence with several Mumbai police officials, including Waze, in February this year.
Taking on the Delhi government on the issue of hike in power and water tariff ahead of Assembly polls, Aam Aadmi Party's Arvind Kejriwal on Monday announced an indefinite fast from March 23 and urged residents to launch a civil disobedience movement by not paying electricity bills.
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