Three months after the Rout, the Congress finally stirs into action. Anita Katyal reports on Wednesday's party convention, the first since the debacle.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday mounted a shrill attack on the Aam Aadmi Party
A senior Congress leader feels the Gandhis should only offer to resign if they are serious about it and have in mind another leader who can take over the party.
With the exit polls projecting a majority for the BJP-led NDA, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday took potshots at the ruling party, saying it will now find a scapegoat in Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in its attempt to save Sonia and Rahul Gandhi from criticism.
Shah said the 'friendship' between Christian Michel, the alleged middleman in the deal, and Congress' top leadership is 'time tested and deep'.
Questioning the "silence" of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi over allegations involving Robert Vadra, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Monday wondered if the internal politics of the Congress does not allow them to speak about them or "defend" Vadra.
BJP spokesperson alleges that the then Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Pulok Chatterjee would "snatch files" from Dr Manmohan Singh to take it to 10 Janpath, Sonia Gandhi's residence.
"We are actually shocked. The prime minister did not even take into confidence chief ministers of Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh, who are directly affected. Here is another show of arrogance of this government," Gandhi told media persons.
Describing the Harish Rawat government in Uttarakhand as "one steeped in corruption", Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah on Saturday asked the people to dislodge it from power and help the lotus "bloom" in the state.
Narendra Modi on Monday vowed to cleanse the political system and Parliament from criminal elements if he comes to power and said his first job would be to set up a panel to probe pending criminal cases against Members of Parliament.
The income tax probe against the Congress leaders has arisen from the investigation into the private criminal complaint filed by Bharatiya Janata Party leader Subramanian Swamy before a trial court in connection with the National Herald case, in which the trio are out on bail.
The nation on Friday remembered former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on her 30th death anniversary with President Pranab Mukherjee, Vice President Hamid Ansari and other leaders paying tributes to her.
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has been made the Chairperson of the party's 50-member Campaign Committee for the 2014 Lok Sabha polls in which Rahul Gandhi will be the Co-Chairman, the party announced on Tuesday night.
The Congress chief has already held talks with several opposition leaders including Nitish Kumar and Sharad Yadav of the Janata Dal-United, Nationalist Congress Party president Sharad Pawar and Left leaders Sitaram Yechury and D Raja, besides Indian Union Muslim League general secretary P K Kunhalikkutty.
The court has now posted the matter for further hearing on May 15.
In his post, Tewari wrote in Hindi in Roman script about how Modi "befooled" people.
Congress leaders are confident that Priyanka would act as a catalyst for the party and boost the sagging morale of cadres to put up a spirited fight against the BJP and also the SP-BSP pre-poll alliance which had already shut its door on the Congress, reports Virendra Singh Rawat.
Arun Shourie, who made a name as an editor par excellence before he chose to join politics, put it in perspective: 'The Rafale judgment enables the media to its job.'
The year 2015 was a mixed bag for the Grand Old party --with the performance in Bihar being a consolation while the the National Herald case came back to haunt its leadership.
Curfew was lifted on Monday from all parts of riot-hit Muzaffarnagar, ten days after it was imposed, as the administration found the situation "conducive" for scaling down the high alert.
The remark came when the former minister was asked what can break the ice in the bilateral dialogue process between India and Pakistan. Aiyar responding to the question, said, "Inko hataiye, humko laiye (remove them from power and bring us to the helm).
Former Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit's statements embarrassed the party, and within hours she alleged she had been 'misquoted'
Informed sources in the Congress party feel that had Priyanka cared about keeping this meeting a secret, it would have remained so. But the attempt to alert the media, thus setting off wide speculation, is part of the Congress's design to enthuse its workers that Rahul's candidature for the top job would bring in Priyanka as well.
All India Congress Committee general secretary Janardhan Dwivedi has created a flutter by saying that the "party leadership should not only speak, but also have the courage to listen".
Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi said in Korba in Chhattisgarh on Friday that chief ministers of Congress ruled states refrain from going among the people fearing that people may throw stones at them.
'Delhi 2015 is a warning of an intensifying nightmare in the offing.'
A day after Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi took a jab at Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and dubbed the Gujarat development model as a 'toffee model', Modi on Tuesday compared Gandhi to a child and said the word toffee had caught his fancy after he had repeatedly spoken about balloon.
'BJP has started a very dangerous game of political vendetta. It will pay a costly price. There is deep desire on the part of the BJP to take political advantage of certain legal issues.' Congressmen react to party chief Sonia Gandhi and Rahul being taken to the court in the National Herald case.
'Though the RSS honours Sardar Patel, who actually banned it, the real hero in the story of its rise is Jayaprakash Narayan,' says Vir Sanghvi.
'For the Congress, it has become necessary to make alliances, but this is not easy to deliver at the local level,' says Aakar Patel.
Syed Firdaus Ashraf lists 10 instances when the BJP didn't pull its punches.
Subramanian Swamy said if income tax is abolished, middle class will deposit money in banks which can be invested in manufacturing.
Rattled by the poll debacle, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Rahul on Monday got into a huddle with senior leaders to carry out a post-mortem of results in the four states amid talk that some heads could roll.
'We can deal with defeat but what is upsetting is that there seems to be no roadmap for the future.' 'What one can say when the high command itself is not appearing to be concerned.' Congress leaders complaining about the lack of vision and the path ahead can heave a sigh of relief after sources said that party president Sonia Gandhi has planned a special brainstorming session next month in order to galvanise the beleaguered party and help reposition it. Anita Katyal in New Delhi reports.
Under constant attack for remaining incommunicado during crucial periods, both Congress president Sonia Gandhi and party vice-president Rahul Gandhi are now making a special effort to come out of their cocoons and articulate their views on key issues, says Anita Katyal.
A slow and ineffective response to allegations of scams under the erstwhile United Progressive Alliace government strengthened anti-Congress impressions in the minds of voters, which resulted in the party's poor show in the Lok Sabha polls, senior Congress leader Mani Shankar Aiyar said on Thursday.
'Narendra Modi knows that the Congress without the Gandhis is a more formidable and more dangerous adversary.'
With Lok Sabha elections knocking on the doors, United Progressive Alliance chairperson and Congress supremo Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi appear to have suddenly woken up to the need to develop their respective constituencies -- Amethi and Rae Bareli.
In the coming days, there would be loud calls for a greater role for Priyanka Vadra who, party leaders think, has a greater voter connect and appeal than her brother who has been pushed into the forefront by their mother.
The presence of a rebel Congress candidate Mani Kumar Subba, a former MP, in the fray has complicated equations in Assam's Tezpur parliamentary constituency where Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi's choice Bhupen Kumar Borah is finding the going tough amid 'Modi wave' sweeping across the seat.
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