Page 412 - Politics
Trump greets PM Modi, says great things in store for US-India ties
US President Donald Trump congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his resounding win at the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, outlining that "great things are in store for the US-India partnership with the return of PM Modi at the helm.""Congratulations to Prime Minister @NarendraModi and his BJP party on their BIG election victory! Great things are in store for the US-India partnership with the return of PM Modi at the helm. I look forward to continuing our important work together!" Trump tweeted on Thursday.The US President joins scores of other world leaders in extending their wishes to PM Modi, as he's slated to undertake his second consecutive term as India's Prime Minister.
India has ended Iranian oil imports: Envoy
India has ended all imports of oil from Iran, its ambassador in Washington said Thursday, becoming the latest country to comply with the US sanctions. India had already sharply decreased its imports from Iran and bought one million tonnes (tons) of crude in April, the last month before Washington stepped up its pressure campaign against Tehran and ended all exemptions to sanctions, Ambassador Harsh Vardhan Shringla said. "That's it. After that we haven't imported any," Shringla told reporters during a briefing on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's election victory. Shringla said India has also ended all imports from Venezuela because it considered itself a partner of the United States -- but said the shift had caused pain at home, with Iran formerly supplying 10 percent of India's oil needs. Calling Iran "an extended neighbour" of India with longstanding cultural links, Shringla declined to say if New Delhi shared President Donald Trump's concerns about Tehran. "This is an issue that has .
Modi wave takes BJP 8 to 14 seats in northeast, NDA tally 17
Powered by the "Modi wave", the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was alone set to win 14 of the 25 Lok Sabha seats in eight northeastern states, against 8 in the 2014 polls.
Voices rise in Congress for organisational changes
With the Congress suffering another debacle in the Lok Sabha elections, demands have started to grow about making big organisational changes in the grand old party.
BJP wins 1 LS seat, 3 Assembly bypolls in Goa
In what could be described as a mixed bag of results, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Goa won one Lok Sabha seat, but lost the other amid a saffron tsunami in the country on Thursday.
Near sweep by BJP in Karnataka, Congress, JD-S routed (Roundup)
Riding on the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the BJP on Thursday made a near sweep in Karnataka, winning 25 of the state's 28 Lok Sabha seats, while another was won by an Independent candidate it supported.
CWC to meet soon, deliberate on Lok Sabha debacle
A meeting of Congress Working Committee is expected to be held soon to look into reasons for the partys debacle in the Lok Sabha elections with party chief Rahul Gandhi expected to give his assessment of what went wrong and the remedial steps that need to be taken.
BJP wins all five seats in Uttarakhand
Repeating the feat of 2014, the BJP on Thursday scored a big victory in Uttarakhand bagging all the five Lok Sabha seats in the state.
DMK alliance routs AIADMK alliance in TN (Roundup)
Bucking the national trend that favoured the BJP, the DMK-led alliance on Thursday dealt a major blow to Tamil Nadu's ruling AIADMK-led alliance which comprised the BJP, as it seemed set to capture 36 of the state's 38 Lok Sabha seats that went for polls on April 18.
BJP set to improve its performance in Odisha
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is set to improve its Lok Sabha performance by penetrating into the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) bastion in Odisha.
Saffron surge sweeps N-E states too (2nd Lead)
The saffron surge that swept the entire country on Thursday also gripped India's north-east with the BJP leading in 14 out of the total 25 seats in the eight northeastern states.
Two once powerful Bengal political landmarks stand desolate on counting day
Amid the bustle in West Bengal on Thursday over the 2019 election results, which turned the state into a bipolar battleground between the ruling Trinamool Congress and the upcoming BJP, silence reigned over two of Kolkata's iconic buildings, named after two stalwarts who once dictated the political rhetoric of the state.
Modi magic steers BJP to historic win in Lok Sabha polls, opposition crushed (Roundup)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday led the BJP to a stunning and historic victory in the Lok Sabha battle, with the ruling party itself set to win 303 seats in a marked improvement over its 2014 showing that left the opposition dazed and demoralized.
BJP wins five seats in Delhi; leading at two
Maintaining its hold over Delhi, the Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday won five of the seven Lok Sabha seats here, while it was leading at two.
BJP hands crushing defeat to Congress in MP
The Congress humiliation is complete. Madhya Pradesh joined the other heartland states in bowing to Modi brand of "nationalism" by handing all but one of the 29 Lok Sabha seats to BJP. Barring Chhindwara that returned the sole Congress candidate Nakul Nath, the BJP swept all including the Guna seat.
BJP's rise ominous sign for Bengal, Trinamool to blame: WB Congress chief
West Bengal Congress President Somen Mitra on Thursday termed Bharatiya Janata Party's unprecedented rise in the state in the 2019 elections as an "ominous sign" and held the ruling Trinamool Congress "solely responsible" for the situation.
BJP reaps benefit of 'rainbow like' alliance in Assam
The saffron surge which swept across Assam on Thursday along with the rest of the country seems to have made it clear that the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2016 made only little impact in the state and the other parts of the northeast even as the ruling BJP in Assam reaped the benefits of a "rainbow like alliance" it had forged in 2016.
Bengal minister Subrata Mukherjee loses to BJP in Bankura
BJP's Subhas Sarkar wrested the Bankura Lok Sabha seat on Thursday from the Trinamool Congress by defeating state minister Subrata Mukherjee by 1,74,333 votes. The BJP candidate managed 6,75,319 votes, while Mukherjee, a veteran in state politics and senior member of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's cabinet, got 5,00,986 votes. In the Maldaha Uttar seat, BJP's Khagen Murmu, who switched sides months ago from the CPI(M), won the elections by defeating TMC's Mausam Noor by a margin of 84,288 votes. Murmu polled 5,09,524 votes and Noor got 4,25,236. Noor, a member of the ABA Ghani Khan Chowdhury family, jumped to the TMC from the Congress months ahead of the elections. In the Coochbehar seat, BJP's Nisith Pramanik got the better of his nearest rival, TMC's Paresh Chandra Adhikary, by 54,231 votes. Pramanik, a former TMC youth leader, polled 7,31,594 votes, while Adhikary got 6,77,363 votes. BJP's Jagannath Sarkar won the Ranaghat Lok Sabha seat by defeating Trinamool ...
Punjab CM intends to change Sidhu's portfolio
Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh Thursday said he intended to change the portfolio of cabinet minister Navjot Singh Sidhu for his "inept" handling of local bodies department. Singh said he would approach the Conghress high command over Sidhu's remarks on the sacrilege issue during sacrilege. A day before polling, Sidhu had raised questions on the probe into the desecration of religious texts in 2015. Singh claimed that the remarks "might have affected the party's performance in Bathinda". He said the urban votebank had been the backbone of the party in the state but Sidhu's failure to do any development work had impacted the Congress, which had performed well this time in rural areas. "I intend to change Sidhu's portfolio for his inept handling of his department," the chief minister said in a statement here. Singh said it was wrong on his part to make the controversial remarks and the minister evidently did not understand that a special investigation team (SIT) had been set up to
Bihar leads tally for NOTA votes
Bihar was leading the tally of voters opting for the None of The Above (NOTA) option while exercising their franchise in the 17th Lok Sabha polls. As per election commission data at midnight, the NOTA vote share stood at about 2 per cent of the total votes polled in the state, where results of almost all the 40 seats had been declared. In the states of UP, Gujarat and West Bengal, 0.84 per cent, 1.38 per cent, 0.96 per cent votes were cast in favour of NOTA. The counting was still on for a few seats in each of these states. NOTA, which was introduced in India following a 2013 Supreme Court directive, allows voters to express their dissent by pressing a button saying none of the contestants are worthy of their vote. In 2014 Lok Sabha polls, where it was introduced for the first time in any parliamentary election, around 60 lakh voters had opted for the NOTA option equalling about 1.1 per cent of the total votes polled during those elections across 543 seats. In 2019 elections, in the .