Page 18 - Election

Telangana Assembly elections: BRS manifesto matches Congress guarantees

The Congress unveiled its 'six guarantees' for the state last month, similar to the ones the Congress government has implemented in neighbouring Karnataka

Mizoram voters wrestle with Zoramthanga's leadership ahead of Nov 7 polls

Regardless of the election outcome, Mizoram is signalling that change is on the horizon

Ticket distribution going 'smoothly', selection on winnability: Gehlot

Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Saturday said the ticket distribution process for the upcoming assembly polls is going on "smoothly" and asserted that candidates would be selected on the basis of winnability as well as the feedback received from a survey conducted. He made the remarks ahead of the screening committee meeting here. Later in the evening, the screening committee met in the party's war room at 15, Gurudwara Rakabganj Road to discuss the names of the candidates put forward by the state's election committee headed by Rajasthan unit chief Govind Singh Dotasra. Lok Sabha member Gaurav Gogoi heads the screening panel for Rajasthan polls, with Ganesh Godiyal and Abhishek Dutt being the other members. Gehlot, Dotasara and senior leader Sachin Pilot are among the other members. "After a very long time, the election committee of the RPCC went to the districts and took feedback... Yesterday, the party chief asked everyone to come to Delhi and give their opinions to the .

Money seized during I-T raids in Karnataka was to be used in polls: BJP

Madhya Pradesh BJP chief V D Sharma on Saturday claimed that the Rs 42 crore recovered by the I-T department during raids on contractors in Karnataka on Friday was meant for next month's polls in five states as he sought to link the seizure with the Congress. Assembly elections will be held in MP, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Mizoram between November 7 and 30, and the counting of votes will be on December 3. This money was found on the premises of contractor Ambikapathy, who on behalf of the Congress, had falsely charged the then BJP government in Karnataka as a 40 per cent commission government, Sharma said while addressing a press conference here. Despite being voted to power in the southern state, Sharma alleged, the Congress could not prove the allegation of 40 per cent commission government. The Income Tax (I-T) Department recovered more than Rs 42 crore in cash, stashed in a residential premise in Bengaluru, on Friday as part of its tax evasion searches against som

Telangana Congress demands CM KCR's resignation, governor rule in state

In light of the transfer of many police, revenue, and excise officials by ECI on Wednesday, the CM has no moral right to continue in the post

Freebies: A zero-sum game

The urge to retain hand-outs that perpetuate power equations has left governments with less to spend on the things that really matter to people

Elections and their discontents

EC pushes for fiscal responsibility

Rajasthan election staff get 500 complaints in 48 hours of MCC imposition

More than 500 complaints were received from across Rajasthan on the C-Vigil app in just 48 hours of the implementation of the Model Code of Conduct in the state, officials said on Wednesday. District Election Officers, or Returning Officers, found 134 complaints correct and resolved them within the stipulated time. Chief Electoral Officer Praveen Gupta said 115 complaints were rejected by the Returning Officers, while six complaints are still pending. The remaining 242 complaints were rejected by the District Control Room at its level, he said. Gupta said that the maximum number of complaints (79) were received from Jaipur district. He said that the C-Vigil app allows resolution of a complaint received on it within 100 minutes. The CEO said that till now lack of documentary evidence in the form of photographs or videos was a hindrance in verification of the complaint, but the app is working to bridge all these gaps.

Five states go to Assembly polls from November 7-30, results on December 3

The results of these elections were thought to indicate the national mood, especially of the heartland states, before the Lok Sabha polls

INDIA bloc a challenge, BJP doesn't take elections casually: Pradhan

The opposition INDIA bloc is a challenge, Union Minister and senior BJP leader Dharmendra Pradhan said on Friday, adding he has requested his party to allow him to contest the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from his home state Odisha. In an interview with PTI, Pradhan, who is a Rajya Sabha member, said the BJP doesn't take any elections casually and the party's agenda is to ensure that Prime Minister Narendra Modi gets to serve the nation for a third term. Asked about whether the INDIA bloc is a real challenge, Pradhan said, "I consider this as a challenge." "The BJP and the NDA do not take any election casually. From ground workers to top leaders, everybody takes each election very seriously and the prime minister leads us from the front, provides a report card of his work, appeals to the people, and exposes the misleading statements and double standards of the opposition. "Some people make alliances out of fear, arrogance or selfishness. They form alliances without principles. Our ...

Election-year budgets

Govt must adhere to the consolidation path

52.6 million voters in Rajasthan, 25.1 million women, says state EC

The total number of voters in Rajasthan has reached 5.26 crore, of which 2.51 crore are women, the state election department said on Wednesday. Chief Electoral Officer Praveen Gupta said during a special brief revision program of voter lists in the state, there has been an increase of over 6.96 lakh voters. Till the date of last publication, over 5.26 crore voters are registered in the state. Of these, over 2.73 crore are men and 2.51 crore are women, he said. Gupta said under this revision program, a total of 11.78 lakh voters above 80 years and 17,241 voters above 100 years are registered in the final published voter list. Similarly, a total of 5.61 lakh specially qualified people are registered as voters. These voters registered in the voter list by the Election Commission of India have been provided the option of voting facility through postal ballot in the form of home voting at the time of elections.

Telangana has 31.7 million eligible voters, 5.8% increase in electors

Telangana has a total of 3,17,17,389 voters, out of whom 1,58,71,493 are men and 1,58,43,339 women, while 2,557 belong to the third gender. An official release issued by the Chief Electoral Officer said the final electoral rolls have been published in all 119 assembly constituencies after the completion of the second special summary revision of voters, and that there is a net 5.8 per cent increase in the number of electors since January 2023. Telangana is gearing up to go for assembly polls in November-December. A 17-member delegation headed by Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar already reached here on Tuesday as part of its three-day visit to assess the state's poll preparedness. During the visit, the team would also engage in a crucial meeting with the state's chief secretary and the the director-general of police to align their efforts with the state administration and security agencies, an official release had earlier said.

107 MPs, MLAs & 480 candidates have hate speech cases against them: ADR

A total of 107 MPs and MLAs have hate speech cases against them and 480 candidates with such cases have contested elections in the last five years, according to poll rights body Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR). The ADR and National Election Watch (NEW) have analysed the self-sworn affidavits of all the incumbent MPs and MLAs, besides the unsuccessful candidates in the Assembly and Lok Sabha polls held in the country in the said period. The analysis reveals that many of the MPs and MLAs, who are designated lawmakers, have actually declared cases related to "hate speech" against themselves. The analysis is based on the affidavits submitted by the MPs and MLAs prior to the last election they contested. According to the analysis, 33 MPs have declared cases related to hate speech against themselves -- seven from Uttar Pradesh, four from Tamil Nadu, three each from Bihar, Karnataka and Telangana, two each from Assam, Gujarat, Maharashtra and West Bengal and one each from Jharkha

BJP Central Election Committee meets to finalise candidates, focus on Raj

The BJP's Central Election Committee members, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, met here on Sunday to finalise its candidates for the coming assembly polls as the party looks to conclude much of deliberations on the contestants before the election process formally begins. For the first time in the current round of CEC meetings, candidates for the Rajasthan polls were discussed as senior party leaders from the state, including former chief minister Vasundhara Raje, joined the national leadership in the meeting. With the party fielding three Union ministers, besides four other MPs, as candidates in the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls, it may continue with the strategy in Rajasthan. Union ministers Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Arjun Ram Meghwal and Kailash Choudhary are from the state where the BJP won all but one of the 25 Lok Sabha seats in 2019. Union ministers Rajnath Singh and Amit Shah, besides party president J P Nadda, are among the members of the CEC. Chhattisgarh BJP leader

No timeline for finalising simultaneous polls report: Law Commission chair

Work is still continuing on the issue of simultaneous polls and no timeline has been given for finalising a report on it, Law Commission Chairman Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi said on Wednesday. He also said the reports on the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and online FIRs have been finalised and sent to the law ministry. "Still some work is going on on simultaneous elections. We have not finalised the report. There is no timeline for finalising it," Justice (retired) Awasthi, who was the chief justice of the Karnataka High Court, told reporters here. According to the procedure, all reports of the law panel are submitted to the Union law ministry, which then forwards those to the ministries concerned. The issue of simultaneous polls is pending with the law panel for years. The previous Law Commission had suggested three options to hold simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, but said several points remained to be addressed. In a public appeal issued along w

LIVE: Women's reservation is the victory of BJP's ideology, says PM Modi

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PM Modi to address mega meet of BJP workers in poll-bound MP on Monday

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a mega congregation of BJP workers here in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh on Monday. The 'Karyakarta Mahakumbh' is being organised on the birth anniversary of Jana Sangh co-founder Deendayal Upadhyaya to mark the formal culmination of the BJP's 'Jan Ashirwad Yatras' that crisscrossed the length and breadth of the state, party leaders said. This will be the third visit of the prime minister to Madhya Pradesh in the past 45 days where the ruling party is locked in a close contest with Congress. According to sources, the BJP has set an ambitious target of gathering 10 lakh people for the Monday event being projected as a show of strength by the saffron party. "Modiji is going to address 'Karyakarta Mahakumbh' at Jamboree Maidan in Bhopal on September 25, the birth anniversary of Deendayal Upadhyaya," MP BJP chief VD Sharma told PTI. The prime minister will arrive at the Maidan at around 11 am. He is expected to leave Bhopal at 1 pm, he added. "La

BJP cannot win more than 7 Lok Sabha seats in Assam this time: AIUDF

However, the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) has claimed that the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will not register a victory on more than 7 out of 14 Lok Sabha seats in Assam this time

Cong dubs Women's Reservation Bill 'election jumla', huge betrayal of hopes

The Congress on Tuesday termed as "election jumla" and "huge betrayal of hopes of women" the women's reservation bill brought by the government, noting the Centre has stated that the reservation will be effective only after a Census and delimitation exercise is conducted post-enactment of the bill. Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh wondered whether the Census and delimitation will be done before the 2024 elections, pointing out that the Narendra Modi government has not yet conducted the 2021 decadal Census. In a post on X, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said, "In a season of election jumlas, this one is the biggest of them all! A huge betrayal of the hopes of crores of Indian women and girls." "As we had pointed out earlier, Modi government has not yet conducted the 2021 Decadal Census making India the only country in G20 that has failed to carry out the Census. Now it says that the reservation for women will come into effect only following the first decadal Census