Top INDIA bloc leaders, including Rahul Gandhi, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Sharad Pawar, Uddhav Thakrey, Akhilesh Yadav and Tejashwi Yadav among others will attend a 'Maharally' to be held by AAP at the Ramleela ground on March 31.
Senior AAP leader Gopal Rai said on Friday that the party has received permission of the authorities concerned for holding the rally, being held in the backdrop of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's arrest, at the Ramleela ground on Sunday for an attendance of more than 20,000 people.
The call on whether Arvind Kejriwal's wife Sunita Kejriwal will address the 'Maharally' will be taken later, he said.
Other prominent political leaders and members of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) like Derek O'Brian, Trichi Siva, Farooq Abdullah and Jharkhand Chief Minister Champai Soren will also attend the rally. Kalpana Soren, the wife of former Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren, who is currently in jail, will also attend.
Sunita Kejriwal preparing to hold CM's post like Rabri Devi did in Bihar: Hardeep Puri
Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Friday compared Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's wife Sunita to former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi, and said she is perhaps preparing to hold the post of her husband.
"The madam you are naming is perhaps preparing to hold the post like Rabri Devi did in Bihar," the senior BJP leader told reporters here at the inauguration of the Delhi BJP's election office.
The Union Minister for Housing and Urban Affairs was responding to a question about Sunita Kejriwal who has been briefing media on behalf of her husband, since his arrest by the ED last week.
Earlier in the day, Sunita Kejriwal launched a WhatsApp campaign, urging people to support her husband, who is in ED custody in an excise policy-linked money-laundering case.
No rebellion, but there can be friendly fights: Pappu Yadav
Former MP Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav, who joined the Congress last week hoping to contest Lok Sabha polls from Purnea in Bihar, on Friday ruled out the possibility of fighting as a rebel candidate, after the seat went to ally RJD.
Yadav, however, dropped hints of his expectations from the party, as he spoke of "friendly fights" in several constituencies among INDIA bloc partners. His wife Ranjit Ranjan is a Rajya Sabha MP of the Congress.
"I am committed to making Rahul Gandhi the country's Prime Minister and helping the Congress revive in Bihar where, five years from now, it will be a force to reckon with in all 40 Lok Sabha constituencies," Yadav told reporters in Purnea (Bihar).
Yadav, whose last electoral success came in 2014, when he won from Madhepura on an RJD ticket, had represented Purnea thrice in the 1990s, two times as an Independent.
Mahagathbandhan announces LS seat-sharing for Bihar; RJD to contest 26, Cong 9
The RJD-led Mahagathbandhan in Bihar on Friday announced its formula for seat-sharing, with Lalu Prasad's party laying claim on nearly two-thirds of the state's 40 parliamentary constituencies, virtually steamrolling allies - the Congress and three Left parties.
The RJD will be contesting 26 seats, nine more than it had fought in 2019 when it drew a blank. The Congress has got nine seats, as many as it had contested in the last elections, followed by CPI(ML) Liberation (three) and CPI and CPI(M) (one each).
The belated announcement, coming a day after filing of nomination papers for the first phase of Lok Sabha polls was over, was made at a press conference in Patna addressed by RJD national spokesman and Rajya Sabha MP Manoj Kumar Jha, state Congress president Akhilesh Prasad Singh and state-level leaders of CPI(ML) Liberation, CPI and CPI(M).
Tejashwi Yadav, the Mahagathbandhan's leader in the state legislature, was scheduled to address the press conference but remained conspicuous by his absence.
BJP elevates Pawar, Chavan as star campaigners
NCP leader Ajit Pawar and former Chief Minister Ashok Chavan, who were once the BJP’s prime targets over corruption allegations, have now become the party’s star campaigners. For over a decade, the BJP had relentlessly targeted Pawar and Chavan, labelling them as “tainted leaders” involved in multi-crore scams. Both leaders featured prominently in the BJP’s 2014 and 2019 election campaigns, where they were portrayed as the face of corruption.
Pawar, who had snatched the NCP from his uncle and aligned with the BJP and Ashok Chavan, who recently joined the BJP, are now among the leaders enlisted by the BJP to canvass for its candidates.
One of the major scandals that plagued Chavan was the Adarsh Housing Society Scam, which implicated several top bureaucrats and politicians.
The scam — involving the construction of a high-rise building for war widows — was exploited by politicians, bureaucrats and military officials to acquire flats.
Chirag Paswan, Nitish Kumar meet after 3-year face-off
Chirag Paswan, back in BJP favour, met his longtime political rival, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. The public meeting, which came after more than three years, was seen as an ice-breaker of sorts, projecting hopes for a better relationship as allies.
The meeting, inevitable after the BJP's open-armed acceptance of Mr Paswan, was brought about by the Chief Minister's close aide Sanjay Jha and two key leaders from the BJP -- Deputy Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary and Health Minister Mangal Pandey -- sources said.
The 30-minute meeting which took place at Mr Kumar's official residence in Patna, was as much about optics as a smoother working relationship.
In the coming Lok Sabha election, the Lok Janshakti Party is contesting on 5 seats, way below JD(U)'s 16 seats.
The last four years have seen bitter discord between the two parties that started with Chirag Paswan contesting against Mr Kumar's Janata Dal United in the 2020 assembly polls. Then came a split in his party in 2021, Mr Kumar's break-up with the BJP and a return to the NDA fold in less than two years.