Farmer outfits on Friday started mobilising more batches of peasants from Haryana and Punjab to head towards Delhi's borders to join the ongoing agitation against agri laws, even as political parties such as the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Indian National Lok Dal threw their weight behind them.
The decision of its two oldest allies to walk out means that Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar, who is also president of the Janata Dal-United, is now the oldest BJP ally besides being the most powerful.
SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal and senior leader Bikram Singh Majithia had raised the issue of a recent statement by Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, who had said in London recently that Congress, as a party, was never involved in the carnage.
The ruling Congress on Wednesday swept the urban body polls in Punjab, winning six municipal corporations, emerging as the largest party in the seventh and bagging most of the 109 municipal council and nagar panchayats.
Pak foreign office said that it was a scuffle between 2 Muslim groups and attempts to paint this incident as a communal issue are 'patently motivated'. It also said that claims of acts of 'desecration and destruction' are not only false but mischievous.
'People belonging to all religions reside in our country and this is our strength that they stay together as a team. Why should you exclude (them)?'
It is "absurd to think" that such a brutality will go unpunished due to ownership of the vehicle, says Punjab deputy CM
Speaking at an event organised to remember former Prime Minister IK Gujral on his 100th birth anniversary, Singh said, "When the sad event of 1984 took place, Gujral ji that very evening went to the then Home Minister Narsimha Rao and said to him that the situation is so grim that it is necessary for the government to call the army at the earliest. If that advice would have been heeded perhaps the massacre that took place in 1984 could have been avoided."
Capt Amarinder lambasted Badal for the alleged growing incidents of sacrilege in the state, which he said was a clear attempt by the Akalis to divide Punjab on communal lines.
In a blow to Punjab Congress, two of its senior leader resigned from the party and joined the ruling Shiromani Akali Dal on Friday.
'The protesters took out a march carrying black flags. They burnt Prime Minister Narendra Modi's effigy while raising slogans against the three farm laws'
Dilip Pandey, Atishi and Raghav Chadha, who unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, will also contest the assembly elections to be held on February 8.
As the Punjab government sought release of the state's prisoners, the union home ministry on Thursday indicated that legal opinion could be taken in select cases such as old people and those having completed 20 years in prison but not those convicted in serious charges.
A Patiala court rejected their bail pleas in the disproportionate assets case.
There is more than what meets the eye to the wealth accumulated by Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal.
Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh is all set to take Punjab's close business as well as people-to-people relations with Canada to the next level, with a one-to-one meeting with visiting Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Amritsar on Wednesday, said an official spokesperson.
The two leaders also discussed the special category status promised to the southern state.
The decision came a day after Punjab Chief Minister Prakash Singh Badal and his deputy Sukhbir Singh Badal approached Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the Home Minister to find a way out to stop Bhullar's execution on the ground of peace and harmony in the state.
Police personnel in adequate strength were deployed across the state to maintain law and order, officials said.
Forty Indian workers have been kidnapped in strife-torn Iraq, prompting the government to launch all-out efforts to trace them. The workers, most of whom may be from Punjab and other parts of north India, were workers of a construction company in Mosul town of Iraq, said External Affairs Ministry spokesman Syed Akbaruddid.
Another Punjab da Puttar may become a neta soon... Why Sonia's illness caused heartburn...Gossip from the Dilli Durbar.
On Sunday, Rajya Sabha passed the Farmers' Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020, and the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020.
In a breakthrough in the ongoing probe into Ponty Chadha murder case, the Delhi police on Sunday recovered a pistol allegedly used during the farmhouse shootout from sacked Uttarakhand Minority Commission Chairman Sukhbir Singh Namdhari's residence in Uttarakhand's Bajpur town.
The body of Indian prisoner Sarabjit Singh was on Thursday night brought to Amritsar onboard a special Air India aircraft from Lahore, where he died following a murderous assault in a jail.
Rediff Labs analyses who's been making the most buzz in the 5 poll-bound states.
0After committing support to the United Progressive Alliance, Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav on Saturday ruled out his involvement in formation of third front before the next Lok Sabha polls even though he had an intriguing meeting with Sukhbir Badal, President of national Democractic Alliance's key constituent Akali Dal.
Amid apprehensions that Sikh hardliners might object to the customary address by the Akal Takht jathedar at the Golden Temple, Amritsar city was turned into a fortress with about 5,000 security personnel comprising seven companies of paramilitary forces being deployed to maintain law and order.
Under pressure from the leadership of the Shiromani Akali Dal, Patiala Mayor Jaspal Pardhan, who has been booked by the police in the murder case of a woman, has resigned. Pardhan's son Preetinder Singh told PTI that his father had late on Monday night sent the resignation letter to party secretary and spokesman Daljit Singh Cheema after the ruling SAD asked him to resign on moral grounds.
A village panchayat on Monday threatened to burn alive four people accused of abducting and raping a minor in Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav's home district Etawah if police failed to take action against them. The decision was taken in a panchayat meeting held at Kheda Helu village, presided over by village head Pankaj Yadav, Circle Officer Arun Dixit said.
Seven policemen of the elite force of Pakistan have been suspended from service for leaving Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal and his delegation unguarded while they went to have dinner at a reception in Lahore, officials said.
Punjab Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal and his 45-member delegation were left unprotected for a short while when their Pakistani police guards left their duty and went off to have dinner at a club in Lahore.
Neither Union agriculture minister nor junior ministers were present to hear our concerns. We asked why the minister is not meeting us, why the government is playing double standards by calling us here and ministers holding virtual meetings in Punjab. There was no proper response," Darshan Pal, member of the coordination committee of 29 farmers' organisations, said after the meeting.
The Shiromani Akali Dal on Tuesday termed as "full of hypocrisy" Rahul Gandhi's remarks that the Congress government tried to stop the anti-Sikh riots and accused it of shielding individuals involved in the "carnage" and delaying deployment the army.
Reports suggested that hundreds of angry residents at Nankana Sahib pelted the Sikh pilgrims with stones on Friday.
Sibal said the BJP always tries to gain a foothold in states where its presence is limited and afterwards "dumps" its allies.
The high-voltage campaign for the February 4 assembly elections in Punjab came to an end on Thursday evening following hectic campaigning by various political parties.
A look at the star arrivals.
The merger was sealed on Friday during a meeting between Badal and Rahul at the latter's residence here where Singh and All India Congress Committee General Secretary Shakeel Ahmad were also present, they said.
An Indian-origin man in Britain has become the first person to have been banned from all 1,200 McDonald's outlets in England and Wales after being caught spying on two women in the restaurant's toilets.
The court will hear MLAs' pleas on Wednesday.
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