From all accounts, it was an ego tussle between BJP patriarch LK Advani and rising star Narendra Modi. Post-elevation at the party’s Goa executive meeting on Sunday, many are in fact hailing the Gujarat chief minister as the new-age Advani. With most of the party leadership reportedly in favour of making Modi the face of BJP, and reveal him as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate f
Having had a good ride over the last eight years since the Janata dal (United), with BJP, assumed power in Bihar, chief minister Nitish Kumar seems to have hit a rough patch of late. While the loss of the by-election for the Maharajganj Lok Sabha seat may still be called a one-off incident, state leaders of both parties are waking up to the fact that the honeymoon period, and the Nitish Kumar g
A full bench of the central information commission (CIC) on Monday ruled that national political parties will now come under the Right to Information (RTI) Act’s ambit. This, in effect, means you can ask questions about funding and functioning, among other issues, of the political parties, which have been deemed to be equal to “public authorities”. “We have no he
The government proposes to replace the 20-year-old collegium system for appointment of judges, law minister Kapil Sibal has said. A legislation is in the offing to set up a judicial appointments commission in its place. The collegium system has been target of much criticism, particularly for lack of transparency. There may not be nothing wrong in reviewing it, but if the government take
There are question marks over the India story as the growth rate is inching closer to where it was when the current PM was brought in as FM more than two decades ago. Fiscal 2012-13 clocked only 5 percent growth. But the central statistical organisation (CSO) has added a hopeful note: that the economy has bottomed out, growth can only pick up from here. Is that believable, given the pop
Aruna Roy, the face of the national advisory council (NAC), has quit the body, criticising the government for ignoring its recommendations. [Also read: After Aruna Roy quits NAC, activists say she did right] Jean Dreze, another member whose presence granted respect and credibility to
Days after pharma major Ranbaxy courted a soup to escape a soup – and agreed to pay a penalty of $500 million in the United States on charges of fraud – one Mumbai hospital has already put an embargo on drugs manufactured by the company, while several others are reportedly toying with the idea. While Jaslok Hospital, a leading medical institution in south Mumbai, has already
Kolkata Police has barred political parties from holding rallies and other protest programmes that “violate the law” in the heart of the city, or holding meetings and rallies at the Metro channel in central Kolkata. The police claim they do not have adequate infrastructure to control such programmes. Explaining the reasons for bringing forth such a ban in a city famous for s
While the alleged rift between the Congress president and the prime minister was not exactly a state secret till even a few days back, Sonia Gandhi backed Manmohan Singh to the hilt at UPA’s ninth anniversary celebrations in New Delhi on May 22. “We respect him and we all stand by him,” Gandhi said about Singh. This bonhomie comes days after Congress leaders close to 10 Janpat
The UPA2 government completes four years today. The Congress-led coalition in fact finishes nine years in power. But its only achievement seemingly is that it has stayed on for such a long time. Its failures are too many to count. The main opposition BJP today termed UPA2 as the most corrupt government we have ever had. Do you agree?
Amid murky allegations of spot-fixing, the demand to bring the Indian cricket board under the Right to Information (RTI) Act has revived. Union minister Ajay Maken, who till recently held the sports portfolio, has tweeted that BCCI should "agree" to come under the RTI Act. In 2011, the government had made a case for this before the central information commission. The matter apparently
Following the arrest of three Rajasthan Royals cricketers on charges of spot-fixing, the Shiv Sena has sought a ban on T20 cricket and IPL as a tournament. The IPL is a den of “gamblers” and the cricketers playing in the league are not playing in the spirit of the game, but batting and bowling for sponsors and big business houses, the party says. According to Sena MP
With about a year to go, the UPA has finally launched its advertising campaign with a budget of Rs 180 crore. The first of the advertisements appeared in the May 13 newspapers. The comparisons are being made with the India Shining campaign of 2004 that was partly blamed for its downfall. Given the intensely negative publicity that the UPA has been attracting thanks to its acts of commissions an
At a time when corruption has cast an unwieldy shadow over governance, at both the central and state levels, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, the BJP’s Rajya Sabha member and one of the party’s chief spokespersons, has sought direct election of the prime minister and the chief ministers of different states. According to Rudy, who has moved a private member’s bill for this, the executive sho
Both the Congress, which swept the assembly elections in the results declared on May 8, and the BJP, which saw its seat share shaved nearly half, are trying to take the Karnataka lessons to national level, though for vastly different reasons. While the Congress believes the victory is a comeback for the party, the saffron corner contends that the general elections are a different ballgame, and
Stressing that the information and broadcasting ministry has not done "anything substantial" and "failed to discharge its responsibility" in curbing the issue of “paid news”, a parliamentary panel has suggested setting up either a new statutory regulator or revamp
Having not done much — in fact, anything, as many would say — the Indian government and the political parties seem to be competing with each to pay tribute to Sarabjit Singh, the Indian national who died following an attack in a Pakistan jail and who was cremated at Bhikiwind in Punjab on May 3. While prime minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday called Sarabjit a “brave son of In
Sarabjit Singh may or may not be the Indian secret agent that Pakistan claims he is but is it not the central government’s duty and responsibility to follow up continuously on Indian citizens jailed abroad? A day after he was attacked by fellow inmates in Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat jail, and lay in ICU, critical, according to doctors at Islamabad’s Zia hospital, prime minister Manmo
The corporate affairs ministry has set up a special task force under the serious fraud investigation office (SFIO) to probe suspected misuse of public money by various chit fund companies. The move comes after the Saradha group, a West Bengal-based chit fund company that had collected hundreds of crores from the poor and small investors in the state, went bust. In Bengal, chief minister
The Supreme Court had last week asked the government to respond on a plea to block pornography websites on the Internet, following a plea that these are a major cause of crime against women. Milind Deora, the minister of state of communications and IT, among the ministries responsible for enforcing any such ban, has
