A majority of over 50,000 internally displaced people are currently staying at relief centres across five valley districts and three hill districts.
Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut has stated that his party wants to go solo in the upcoming local body elections to strengthen its base. This statement has raised questions about the unity of the opposition INDIA bloc and the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), which includes Shiv Sena (UBT), Congress, and NCP (SP). Raut clarified that the party has not called for the dissolution of either bloc and that the local body elections are an opportunity to empower party workers at the grassroots level. He also criticized Congress leaders for reacting to his comments without hearing the full context.
Over 60 per cent voter turnout was recorded on Monday in 49 constituencies in six states and two Union territories in the fifth phase of Lok Sabha elections, with Baramulla in Jammu and Kashmir recording its highest-ever voting percentage.
"Before the BJP came into existence, its forerunners Jan Sangh and RSS had opposed Babasaheb while the Constitution was being adopted," Prakash Ambedkar, who heads Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi, told reporters in Pune.
"Religion should remain within the four walls of your home. A Hindu identifies as a Hindu only when Muslims take to the streets or during riots; otherwise, Hindus are divided by caste," he said.
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).
A 30-year-old man was hacked to death by Naxalites in Chhattisgarh's Dantewada district on the suspicion of being a police informer. The incident comes close on the heels of the murder of two men, one of them a former Naxalite, in neighbouring Bijapur district two days ago. The two were killed by Naxalites, as per the police. Earlier on January 26, Naxalites killed a 41-year-old man in Bhairamgarh area of Bijapur, accusing him of being an informer. On January 16, Naxalites killed a 48-year-old man in Mirtur area of Bijapur for the same reason.
Sporadic incidents of violence were reported on Tuesday in some areas where voting is underway in the third phase of the West Bengal assembly elections, even as the overall situation by and large remained peaceful with 34.71 per cent turnout recorded till 11 am, officials said.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi launched a scathing attack on AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal during his campaign rallies in Delhi, accusing him of being involved in the "liquor scam" and of being "afraid" of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Gandhi also criticized Kejriwal's governance style, calling it "sheesh mahal politics" and accusing him of being absent when violence and hatred engulfed Delhi during the 2020 riots. He also attacked the BJP, accusing them of trying to change the Constitution and insulting the country's founding fathers.
The ministry said that the media and the public's concerns about the late processing of the results have been reviewed.
Saturday's voting will mark the end to the marathon polling process that began on April 19 month and has already covered 486 Lok Sabha seats in 28 states and Union territories.
The alleged entry of 'plainclothes police personnel' on the university campus on Monday also did not go down well with a section of the students and teachers.
Kumar said the increase was due to Outer Manipur being counted twice, since polls will be held there in two phases.
Voters in Muslim-dominated Nuh in Haryana have made the Congress victorious in all three assembly seats in the district, with one of the contestants registering the highest victory margin.
The Supreme Court of India has granted interim bail to Tahir Hussain, a former councillor accused in the 2020 Delhi riots. Justice Ahsanuddin Amanullah, while granting bail, said the allegations against Hussain were grave but as of now they were just allegations. The bench, however, delivered a split verdict, with Justice Pankaj Mithal opposing the bail. The court also questioned the Delhi Police for the delay in the trial over the murder of Intelligence Bureau staffer Ankit Sharma during the riots.
Uttarakhand has become the first state in India to implement the Uniform Civil Code (UCC), fulfilling a key promise made by the ruling BJP ahead of the 2022 Assembly elections. Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami unveiled the UCC notification and launched a portal for mandatory online registration of marriages, divorces, and live-in relationships. The UCC aims to create equal laws for all citizens regardless of their religion, marking a historic moment in the state's legal landscape.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said his government has made a "solemn promise" for restoration of Jammu and Kashmir's statehood and will stand by it, adding the Centre was working very hard to create the right conditions.
The over two-minute campaign song, penned and sung by AAP MLA Dilip Pandey, was released at the party headquarters in New Delhi on Thursday.
'The kind of situation we are seeing...we don't believe that this can happen in a settled democracy like India'
The commission said polling was held at 15,940 polling stations spread across 44 assembly constituencies in this phase of polls.
Living separately and refusing to co-exist in future, many members of both Kukis and Meitis communities ask - why elections at this time and what difference will they make?
Besides Defence Minister Singh (Lucknow), Minister of Women and Child Development Irani (Amethi), those in the fray are Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs Kaushal Kishor (Mohanlalganj) and Minister of State of Consumer Affairs Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti (Fatehpur).
'Women' as a political constituency appears to be an idea that has come of age. It is changing India in ways that we only dimly understand, asserts Aditi Phadnis.
'It was a disaster on his part to give an oral remark which allowed ascertainment of the religious character of places of worship.' 'This disrupted the social harmony of the country.'
Three persons, including two supporters of the Indian Secular Front (ISF), were killed and several policemen injured in West Bengal's South 24 Parganas district as a clash broke out outside a centre where counting of votes for rural polls was going on, police said on Wednesday.
Campaigning for May 13 elections in 96 Lok Sabha constituencies across 10 states and Union territories including all seats in Andhra Pradesh, where assembly elections are also being held concurrently, and Telangana concluded on Saturday evening.
The BJP, which has allied with a few smaller parties, has sought to upend the state's conventional politics, which has so far been indifferent to Hindutva politics, by taking the ruling DMK head-on for its alleged insult of Sanatan Dharma besides involvement in corruption.
The party's prime mover in West Bengal and the state Pradesh Congress president was stunned by Trinamool Congress's star candidate and cricketer-turned-politician Yusuf Pathan who comprehensively defeated Chowdhury by a margin of over 85,000 votes.
The Union home ministry has initiated disciplinary action against Kolkata Police Commissioner Vineet Goyal and a Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) for allegedly maligning the office of the West Bengal Governor by promoting and spreading canards, a central government official said.
The Jawaharlal Nehru University Students Union (JNUSU) on Sunday elected its first Dalit president from the Left-backed groups after nearly three decades.
The PML-N, however, rejected the demand and claimed that it was winning Thursday's elections.
She is the 21st chief minister of West Bengal and 8th person to hold the office.
Voters include 8.4 crore men, 8.23 crore women and 11,371 from third gender. There are as many as 35.67 lakh first time voters, besides 3.51 crore young voters in the age group of 20-29 years.
Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal's car was pelted with stones during campaigning in the New Delhi constituency on Saturday, the party alleged.
As the Queen star found herself in the middle of a row, with the BJP distancing itself and the Congress attacking it, here's a look at some of the controversies, political and otherwise.
Sporadic incidents of violence were reported from various places that went to polls on Saturday during the first phase of the West Bengal assembly election, even as the overall poll situation was largely peaceful with 79.79 per cent turnout recorded till the end of voting, an official said.
Moments after administering the oath to the ministers of the Mamata Banerjee government, Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar on Monday expressed concern over the situation arising out of post-poll violence in the state and said he would soon be visiting the affected areas.
The result is a big blow to the military establishment, revealing the limits of 'political engineering'. It reflected the anger of the electorate, especially its younger voters, who have spoken decisively against the persistent harassment and victimisation of Imran Khan's political party, asserts Rana Banerji, who headed the Pakistan desk at RA&W.
India stressed that it is even more extraordinary for a country with a history of rigged elections to talk about political choices, that too in a democracy.
Bangladeshis on Sunday began voting in the general elections expected to be won by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the absence of the main Opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) which is boycotting it.
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