Rahul Gandhi was booked on Tuesday for 'wanton acts of violence' by the Assam Police as the political confrontation between the Congress leader and state Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma escalated on the tenth day of the 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra', with Gandhi asserting that he does not get 'intimidated' by such tactics.
Chandra Bose had joined the BJP in 2016 and had twice contested on the BJP ticket -- in the 2016 assembly and the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Senior Congress leader Anand Sharma scotched speculation about his meeting with BJP president J P Nadda on Thursday, saying if he had to, he would do so openly as they both hailed from Himachal Pradesh and studied at the same university.
The share of candidates who were successful among the BJP was 56.5% in 2019. It was 5% for the Congress.
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.
Entertainers can be good politicians if they treat the citizens as the audience, and treat their job like a live show, and work hard to make sure the audience likes them, asserts Sandeep Goyal.
The Congress has been in the crosshairs after demeaning remarks on Ranaut and Mandi were posted on the social media handles of its leaders Supriya Shrinate and H S Ahir.
Senior leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress were stopped by police on Friday from visiting the trouble-torn Sandeshkhali, escalating the political tensions in the state as the leaders accused West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee of fostering a 'lawless situation' and attempting to 'communalise' the issue.
Barring 2004 and 2009 when Navjot Singh Sidhu won the Amritsar seat as a BJP MP and 1998 when Daya Singh Sodhi from BJP was elected as the MP, it has essentially a Congress bastion.
President Droupadi Murmu on Saturday conferred Bharat Ratna, the country's highest civilian honour, on former prime ministers P V Narasimha Rao and Chaudhary Charan Singh, agriculture scientist M S Swaminathan and two-time former Bihar chief minister Karpoori Thakur, posthumously at a ceremony held at the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi.
The TDP and JD-U will have a lot to answer inside Parliament, day after day, session after session, notes N Sathiya Moorthy.
Former Karnataka chief minister Jagdish Shettar, who had quit the Bharatiya Janata Party to join the Congress ahead of the state assembly polls last year, rejoined his old party on Thursday.
An effective booth-level strategy, strong organisational manoeuvre and the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan are among the key factors that turned the tide in favour of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls.
'The Congress is trying to reinvent itself -- the caste census demand, OBC emphasis, the anti-corporate thrust, especially on Adani etc -- all this is not standard Congress strategy.'
Five MLAs -- four from the BJP and one independent -- were also sworn in as ministers. However, former home minister and six-term MLA from Ambala Cantt, Anil Vij, has not found a place in the new cabinet.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and a strong team of Union ministers figure in the list of the party's 40 star campaigners for Karnataka assembly elections next month.
Ajit Pawar-led group was the real Nationalist Congress Party when two factions emerged in the party in July 2023, Maharashtra assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar on Thursday held.
The Bharatiya Janata Party sealed its alliance with the Telugu Desam Party on Saturday for the upcoming Lok Sabha and Andhra Pradesh assembly elections, with former chief minister of the southern state N Chandrababu Naidu asserting that the combine will sweep the polls.
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.
The BJP is focusing determinedly on the seats it lost in 2019, with the hope of winning these either independently or with the aid of its allies.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday said she declined the offer of the Bharatiya Janata Party to contest elections pleading that she did not have the 'kind of funds' required for fighting the Lok Sabha polls.
A day after the Bharatiya Janata Party scored big wins in three assembly polls, talk within the party shifted to the likely chief ministerial picks in these states, with senior leaders holding discussions on Monday.
For the first time in his political career, he failed to carry his party to even a working majority -- and again, for the first time in his career, he finds himself in a situation where he cannot rule by dictatorial fiat, points out Prem Panicker.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde was among those who mourned her loss, and visited her home.
The Bharatiya Janata Party has set its sights on winning an 'unprecedented majority' in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi asking key organisational leaders to work towards boosting the party's vote share by 10 per cent, sources said.
'Whether I turn 75 or 85, I will remain active in politics and contest the next election. I like politics very much'
The BJP will enter this election, as it does every election, as if it is fighting to prevent a 2004-style defeat. This is a party that wins big because it always behaves as if its back is to the wall, predicts Mihir S Sharma.
Union minister and the BJP's election in-charge for Rajasthan Pralhad Joshi, co-in-charge Nitin Patel, the party's in-charge for Rajasthan Arun Singh, state president C P Joshi, Union ministers Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Arjun Ram Meghwal and Kailash Chaudhary, Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly Rajendra Rathore, Deputy Leader of Opposition and former state president Satish Poonia and other leaders were present at the meeting, which is likely to continue till late, the sources said.
Karnataka would vote on May 10, and the results will be declared on May 13.
Sixty-eight Rajya Sabha members, including nine Union ministers, are completing their tenure this year, triggering a race of sorts among leaders across political parties to eye a six-year term in the Upper House of Parliament.
'Somebody was using somebody to make statements that will stir the stock market and lead to a surge.' 'A sudden surge and a sudden crash is always an ideal situation for people to make illicit gains and then siphoning off the money.'
Rashtriya Janata Dal president Lalu Prasad Yadav had thrown barbs at the prime minister over his having no family.
Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Manoj Sonkar on Tuesday defeated Aam Aadmi Party's Kuldeep Kumar to win the post of mayor in the Chandigarh mayoral polls.
'One needs to understand what kind of means the BJP use to bring other party leaders in their party.' 'They are unscrupulous politicians and money plays an important role.'
Leaders of 38 parties have confirmed their participation in a meeting of the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to be held in the national capital on Tuesday, Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address Bharatiya Janata Party members on the party's foundation day on Thursday.
'Commentators have said that dealing with allies as equals will make Modi more sensitive.' 'Remember that the people Modi is dealing with are equally autocratic in their own lairs.' 'Further, Modi always has handy the threat of dissolving Parliament and calling for fresh polls.' 'Most of his own party, and certainly his allies and opponents having blown their budgets of efforts and resources in the just concluded elections, have no stomach for this.' 'They are all greatly looking forward to the loaves and fishes of office on offer.' 'That gives Modi an unbeatable advantage in any push-comes-to-shove situation,' explains Shreekant Sambrani.
The BJP holds 28 of the 59 Rajya Sabha seats that will soon face election.
While about 8,000 people are in the long list of invitees, the select list features 506 A-listers, including prominent politicians, leading industrialists, top film stars, sportspersons, diplomats, judges and high priests.
The last two I-T teams left the premises, one each in Odisha and Jharkhand, carrying with them a number of seized "incriminating documents" and data cloned from electronic gadgets in the early morning hours.
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