VIJAYAWADA: 

Jagan Mohan Reddy, who led his party to an astounding victory in Andhra Pradesh, took as the Chief Minister of the state. He is the second Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh post its bifurcation.

Jagan Reddy, 46, was administered the oath by Governor ESL Narasimhan at 12.23 pm at a grand public function in Vijayawada. He got a hero’s welcome as he reached the venue in an open jeep, with people cheering as his convoy passed.

N Chandrababu Naidu, who was virtually decimated by Jagan Reddy’s YSR Congress, turned down the latter’s invite to the swearing-in. Mr Naidu chose to send a delegation of his party to congratulate Mr Reddy at his home before the ceremony.

Among the VIPs in attendance were Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao and DMK chief MK Stalin from Tamil Nadu. Both the leaders will fly to Delhi for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s swearing-in this evening for a second term.

On Sunday, Mr Reddy had met PM Modi and BJP president Amit Shah in Delhi. “I met the first and second most important persons in the country, to seek best possible assistance for Andhra Pradesh,” he said after the meeting.

The YSR Congress bagged 151 of the 175 seats in the state assembly and 22 of the 25 Lok Sabha seats, handing out a huge blow to Mr Naidu’s Telguu Desam Party.

Mr Reddy is the son of one of Andhra Pradesh’s most popular Chief Ministers, YS Rajashekhara Reddy, who died in a chopper crash in 2009. The 46-year-old, who inherited his father’s supporters, still had to make his mark at the head of a new party formed in 2011. The moment came during his two foot marches – the last one over the special status for Andhra Pradesh, undertaken last year.

It was Jagan Reddy’s push for the Special Status for Andhra Pradesh that is said to be at the bottom of Chandrababu Naidu’s move to part company with the BJP and join the opposition camp.

Since the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, it has been a pattern of electing only one woman, which was followed in 2004, 2009 and 2014.

Of the 16 women candidates who contested from Delhi, only Meenakshi Lekhi of the BJP has got elected.
NEW DELHI: 

Delhi has elected only one woman to enter the Lok Sabha, yet again. Of the 16 women candidates who contested from seven Lok Sabha constituencies of Delhi, only Meenakshi Lekhi of the Bharatiya Janata Party has got elected.

There were 164 candidates in total.

Out of the total 16 general elections held in Delhi since Independence, it has been seven times that only one woman candidate was elected.

Since the 1999 Lok Sabha elections, it has been a pattern of electing only one woman, which was followed in 2004, 2009 and 2014.

The same has been repeated this time.

Delhi did not elect any female candidate six times and only thrice, out of 16 Lok Sabha elections, it elected more than one woman candidate. 

Two women were elected from Delhi each in the fifth (1971), 11th (1996) and the 12th (1988) Lok Sabha elections.

In the 1996 and 1998 elections, BJP’s Sushma Swaraj and Congress’ Meira Kumar were elected from Delhi.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha, on all the seven seats, there was a triangular contest between Delhi’s ruling Aam Aadmi Party, the BJP in power at the Centre and the Congress.

While all the three parties are vocal about woman empowerment, each of them had named only one female candidate among their seven candidates.

The Congress fielded its three-time Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, who came second in the North East Delhi seat as BJP’s Manoj Tiwari won.

The AAP named 37-year-old Atishi from the East Delhi Lok Sabha seat. She came third.

In New Delhi Lok Sabha constituency, BJP’s 51-year-old Meenakashi Lekhi was among the two woman candidates out of 27 people in the fray.

The number of women to contest the 2019 elections in the national capital saw an increase compared to 2014 but down from that in 2009.

In 2014, out of 150 candidates, 13 were women; while in 2009, out of 160 candidates, 18 women contested the elections. However, only one woman each time managed to reach the Lower House.

In 2009, Congress’ Krishna Tirath and in 2014, BJP’s Meenakshi Lekhi became the sole females to be elected to the House from the city.

Krishna Tirath was also the single woman elected from Delhi in 2004, while in 1999, BJP’s Anita Arya was elected from the Karol Bagh seat.COMMENT

Delhi has also elected a single woman parliamentarian in the first, second and eighth Lok Sabha. No female was elected from the city in the third, fourth, sixth, seventh, ninth and 10th Lok Sabha.

After voting ended in a massive month-and-a-half long election on Sunday, several exit polls on television channels projected an NDA landslide and another term for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The exit polls suggest that Mayawati and Akhilesh Yadav may take around 30 seats in 80-seat UP.
NEW DELHI: 

Mayawati will not come to Delhi today for any meetings with opposition leaders, her Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has said, contradicting reports about her meeting with Congress president Rahul Gandhi and his mother Sonia Gandhi, which was seen as a significant step in opposition consolidation moves.

“Mayawati ji has no programme or meetings scheduled in Delhi today, she will be in Lucknow,” Mayawati’s top aide Satish Chandra Mishra told news agency ANI on Monday, a day after most exit polls predicted that the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) would return with a clear majority.

Reports had suggested that Mayawati was to meet the Gandhis ahead of the national election result on Thursday, May 23. The meeting, said the reports, had been arranged at the instance of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu, who has been the go-between. Mr Naidu met with Mayawati in Lucknow and also held discussions with Rahul Gandhi twice. The Telugu Desam Party leader met with Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi on Sunday and is expected to talk to Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who had yesterday dismissed “exit poll gossip”.

If he does manage to get Mayawati to talk to the Gandhis, it will be quite a feat. The BSP chief spent much of her national election campaign targeting the Congress in the same breath as the BJP, unable to get past the huge disagreement over seat sharing for December state polls.

After voting ended in a massive month-and-a-half long election on Sunday, several exit polls on television channels projected an NDA landslide and another term for Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

While the BJP and its allies are predicted to win 303 seats in the 543-member Lok Sabha, the Congress and its allies have been given 122 and parties that are not with any of the two combines so far are said to be looking at a score of 117.

The exit polls also suggest that Mayawati and her rival-turned-alliance partner Akhilesh Yadav may take around 30 seats in 80-seat Uttar Pradesh, significantly reducing the BJP’s tally from its 2014 sweep of 71; the ruling party may win enough seats in Bengal and Odisha to offset the loss.

Sources say Mayawati may be waiting for the actual results before her next move. For now, exit poll predictions present a grim scenario for the opposition bloc.

The Supreme Court today questioned the West Bengal government why BJP activist Priyanka Sharma was made to spend another night in jail despite the court ordering her release on Tuesday

Priyanka Sharma was released at 9:40 am today, West Bengal government told Supreme Court
NEW DELHI: 

The Supreme Court today questioned the West Bengal government why BJP activist Priyanka Sharma, who last week shared a meme of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, was made to spend another night in jail despite the court ordering her release on Tuesday.

“The arrest was prime facie arbitrary,” the top court said today.

Priyanka Sharma was arrested last Friday after she shared a photo in which Ms Banerjee’s face has been morphed on the form of actor Priyanka Chopra. In the original picture, the actor was photographed at the MET Gala in New York.

When the Bengal government’s lawyer told the court that Ms Sharma was released at 9:40 am today, the court said, “Why 9:40 am? The order was passed in your presence?”

HD Kumaraswamy is scheduled to canvass for Congress candidates in Kundgol and Chincholi assembly by-polls on May 13 and 14.

BJP tweeted “do take a look at Bengaluru infrastructure collapse” tagging HD Kumaraswamy. (File)
BENGALURU: 

1. HD Kumaraswamy camped at resort in Kodagu for 2 days after treatment
2. BJP asked him to look at Bengaluru’s infrastructure
3. BS Yeddyurappa had said Mr Kumaraswamy was unhappy with dissidence

Taking a dig at Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy for his stay at a resort, Karnataka BJP Sunday asked him to take time out and look at the city’s collapsing infrastructure and drought situation in the state.

HD Kumaraswamy, who recently returned from a resort in Udupi where he underwent treatment and visited some temples, was camping at a resort in Kodagu district for the last two days. 

Hitting out at Chief Minister for his frequent resort visits when the state was facing severe drought, leader of the opposition in the assembly BS Yeddyurappa had recently said that the timing reflects he was unhappy over the political situation and dissidence within the the ruling coalition.

HD Kumaraswamy is scheduled to canvass for Congress candidates in Kundgol and Chincholi assembly by-polls on May 13 and 14.

The Chief Minister, who will reach Kundgol on Monday evening, will campaign for the Congress candidate there. 

The next day he will travel to Kalaburagi and participate in some programmes there, before leaving for Chincholi to take part in the campaign event there.

The JD(S), which does not have much presence in the region,is supporting its alliance partner Congress’ candidates in both the seats that are going for the May 19 bypolls.

The by-poll to Chincholi has been necessitated by the resignation of sitting member Umesh Jadhav, who quit Congress and joined the BJP to contest the recent Lok Sabha polls from Gulbarga, while the Kundgol seat fell vacant following the death of Minister C S Shivalli

The outcome of the by-polls, along with that of the elections to 28 Lok Sabha constituencies in Karnataka, held in two phases on April 18 and 23, is crucial for the ruling Congress-JD(S) alliance, facing a fresh bout of

PM Modi, while criticizing the Congress government, also lashed out at Mayawati for continuing her support to the government.

LUCKNOW:  Alwar gang-rape case: Mayawati said PM Modi is trying to play dirty politics over it.

Accused by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of “shedding crocodile tears” over the Alwar gang-rape, Mayawati today let loose a vitriolic attack on the PM, accusing him of “dramebaazi (playacting) with his love for Dalits” and also taunting him on his wife.

“Yesterday PM Modi, in his election rallies here, did dramebaazi of his love for Dalits to draw Dalits but he will gain nothing from this…He was silent on the oppression of Dalits. He is trying to play dirty politics over it,” the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leader said today.

“How can he respect others’ sisters and wives when he has left his own wife for political gains? It is my special appeal to women of this country not to vote a person like this. PM Modi, in this election, kept changing his caste according to the situation.”

Mayawati’s comments invited a strong reaction from Union Minister Arun Jaitley who tweeted: “Behan Mayawati – She is firm on becoming a Prime Minister. Her governance, ethics and discourse stoops to an all-time low.  Her personal attack today on the Prime Minister exposes her as unfit for public life.”

Mamata Didi – Democracy has become a casualty in Bengal. Opposition workers are murdered, candidates are attacked, polling booths are captured and Opposition leaders are not entitled to organise rallies.

Behan Mayawati – She is firm on becoming a Prime Minister. Her governance, ethics and discourse stoops to an all-time low. Her personal attack today on the Prime Minister exposes her as unfit for public life

The political row involves the gang-rape on April 26 of a Dalit woman by six men who allegedly also beat up her husband in Alwar. The attackers filmed the act and allegedly posted the clip online. The woman’s family has alleged that the police delayed filing a case because of the national election in Rajasthan, where the Congress took power in December after the BJP’s defeat.

Alwar gang-rape case: Five people have been arrested in connection with the crime., saying the party had suppressed the incident till the end of elections to avoid any incidents.

PM Modi, while criticising the Congress government, also lashed out at Mayawati for continuing her support to the government.”Today the daughters of Uttar Pradesh are asking Behen-ji (Mayawati) that the government in Rajasthan is running with your support and there, a girl from Scheduled Castes got raped. So Behen-ji, why have you not withdrawn your support?” PM Modi said in a Hindi post on Twitter.

The Prime Minister had, in another recent attack, commented that the Congress and the Samajwadi Party were using Mayawati and playing a “big game” against her. Mayawati had responded by putting out a strong message of unity and asserting that the Congress would get every gathbandhan vote in Amethi and Raebareli, the seats of the Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi.

The Congress was left out of the Akhilesh Yadav-Mayawati gathbandhan or alliance and has contested along in many seats in Uttar Pradesh, raising the possibility of anti-BJP votes being split.

The PM has often raised the spectre of a weak and divided opposition in his campaign.

Kamal Haasan said in Tamil, “I am not saying this because this is a Muslim-dominated area, but I am saying this before a statue of Gandhi. Independent India’s first extremist was a Hindu, his name is Nathuram Godse.”

ARAVAKURICHI:  Kamal Haasan was campaigning for the bypolls in Tamil Nadu’s Karur district.

Actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan said on Sunday that the first extremist in Independent India was a Hindu. Mr Haasan was referring to Nathuram Godse who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi in 1948.

“I am not saying this because this is a Muslim-dominated area, but I am saying this before a statue of Gandhi. Independent India’s first extremist (theevravaadi) was a Hindu, his name is Nathuram Godse. There it starts,” Kamal Haasan said while campaigning in the town of Aravakurichi in Tamil Nadu’s Karur district on Sunday night.

Aravakurichi is one of the four assembly constituencies where bypolls are scheduled on May 19. Kamal Haasan’s Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) has fielded a candidate from that seat.

Standing out of the sunroof of a vehicle, Mr Haasan, 64, said he is the Mahatma’s “great-grandson in spirit” and that he came there to question the his assassination.

“Good Indians desire for equality and want the three colours in the tricolour to remain intact. I am a good Indian, will proudly proclaim that,” he added.

In November 2017, the Tamil mega-star had stoked a controversy by saying that extremism has infected right-wing groups, provoking a confrontation with the BJP. “In the past, Hindu, right-wing groups would not indulge in violence. They would hold a dialogue with opponents. But now they resort to violence,” Mr Haasan said.

Months later, he said he is not “anti-Hindu” nor against any other religion.

Earlier this year, Kamal Haasan had blamed the right-wing the widespread protests that erupted in Kerala over the Sabarimala temple issue.

The actor launched his party in February last year and fielded candidates in all 39 Lok Sabha seats in Tamil Nadu

The other superstar from Tamil Nadu, Rajinikanth, who has also joined politics, skipped the mega polls to focus on the 2021 Tamil Nadu election.

Gautam Gambhir sent a defamation notice through Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s daughter Sonali Jaitley to AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and Atishi.

NEW DELHI:  Manish Sisodia said the alleged impersonator is a Congress leader.

Gautam Gambhir, the BJP’s East Delhi candidate, has placed his “duplicate” to campaign for him as he has a problem with the heat, Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia alleged on Friday, amid the ongoing tussle between the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the BJP over the controversial pamphlet against AAP candidate Atishi. The AAP leader, in a couple of tweets, also shared the pictures of the alleged impersonator, who, he says, is a Congress leader.

“Have heard about a stunt double in movies, a runner in cricket, but have seen a duplicate in campaign for the first time,” Mr Sisodia tweeted in Hindi.

“This is the mahamilawat between the Congress and the BJP. Gautam Gambhir is sitting in an air conditioned car. He has problem with the heat. In his place, a duplicate wearing a cap is standing. Workers are garlanding the duplicate Gambhir. And this duplicate is a Congress leader in reality,” he added.

The East Delhi constituency is turning out to be the most hard-fought seat in Delhi, with a pitched battle raging on between the two candidates– Gautam Gambhir and Atishi.

The AAP candidate had recently raised technical objections, seeking Mr Gambhir’s nomination. The requests were turned down by the Election Commission.

On Thursday, Atishi broke down at a press conference called by the AAP, where leaders displayed a pamphlet full of religious and sexist attacks on the candidate. “If Gambhir can stoop so low to defeat a strong woman like me, how can he ensure security for women as an MP?” asked the 37-year-old Oxford alumnus.

On Friday, Mr Gambhir, who had denied the allegation, sent a defamation notice through Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s daughter Sonali Jaitley to AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and Atishi. The AAP candidate also filed a complaint against her BJP rival with the Delhi Commission For Women.The women’s body had asked the police whether it had filed a First Information Report or FIR over the circulation of the derogatory pamphlets.

Mr Sisodia has also warned Mr Gambhir that he would send a defamation suit.

“How is he filing a defamation case? We are the ones being defamed, we will file a defamation case against him. We will try to send a defamation notice to him today. His party has endorsed the pamphlets and he has not questioned that,” the Delhi Education Minister told NDTV

Delhi will vote in the sixth phase of the national election on May 12. The counting of votes will begin on May 23.