Criticising colleagues on poll eve is not a serious issue: PM

August 23rd, 2009 NEW DELHI - Sudheendra Kulkarni, a key aide to senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani and also to former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, has snapped his ties with the party over "major ideological differences".

August 5th, 2009 LUCKNOW - The 60 red-stone elephants installed in the Rs.750 crore Ambedkar Park cum memorial here have nothing in common with the election symbol of Chief Minister Mayawati's Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), party general secretary Satish Chandra Misra said Wednesday. Reacting to an Election Commission notice to BSP, Misra said in a statement: "The elephants installed at the Ambedkar memorial are in a typically traditional welcome position with their trunks raised up in the air, while the elephant in the party symbol has its trunk in the normal posture." Criticising the opposition parties for raising the issue before the poll panel, he argued, "We have introduced a scheme to gift bicycles to young girls.

June 15th, 2009 BHOPAL - Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Sushma Swaraj has declined to join issue with her colleagues over the reasons for the party's poll debacle, saying "it is best to keep quiet when a volcano has erupted". "(In such circumstances) raising any new issue could do the job of a spark," she told a few media persons here Sunday evening.

May 18th, 2009 NEW DELHI - All India Congress Committee (AICC) General Secretary Digvijay Singh on Monday said the Congress would discuss the issue of government formation only with its pre-poll allies, of which the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) is not a part. "Along with the Congress, we have the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), the Trinamool Congress (TC), the National Conference (NC), Kerala Congress and Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM).

May 15th, 2009 NEW DELHI - Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh on Friday put a dampener on speculations of any alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Squashing rumours of any talks of forging a post-poll alliance fuelled by his meeting with BJP president Rajnath Singh, Amar said, "It was not possible as there was an ideological difference between the two parties." "I don't think so because there is a core issue of difference between us and them.

May 2nd, 2009 NEW DELHI - The Election Commission Saturday asked the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) to explain why its advertisement of the New Pension Scheme' had been different from the version for which the poll panel had given permission. The poll panel asked the pension authority to explain the deviation and non-compliance with the panel's order for the advertisement which appeared in the Hindu newspaper.

May 2nd, 2009 NEW DELHI - Political turncoats are not hard to find during election time. And turning against them publicly can rebound sometimes - as was the case with Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal.

April 24th, 2009 NEW DELHI - The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) seems to be a divided house on the issue of supporting a Congress-led government at the centre after the elections. While party chief Prakash Karat is insistent that the Left will not provide support, senior party colleagues from West Bengal have not ruled out the possibility.

April 23rd, 2009 LUCKNOW - The Ram temple was very much an issue this election and the party's Hindutva's agenda was intact, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP leader Vinay Katiyar said Thursday. 'The Ram temple is an issue in this election but presently we will not disclose our strategy on how we are going to solve it,' Katiyar told reporters in Faizabad, 180 km from this Uttar Pradesh capital, about the Ram temple in Ayodhya.

April 15th, 2009 RAIPUR - Over 1,000 lives have been lost in Maoist violence in Chhattisgarh since 2005 but Maoism hardly finds a mention during the poll season with both the main parties - the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress - completely ignoring the issue during campaigning. Eleven Lok Sabha seats in the state go to the polls in the first phase Thursday.

April 14th, 2009 DHARAMSALA - Scarcity of drinking water has become a major poll issue in Dharamsala. Villagers have made up their mind that they will cast votes for a candidate who would solve their water problem.

April 7th, 2009 NEW DELHI - The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Tuesday requested the Election Commission to create an appropriate atmosphere for holding free and fair elections in three hill sub-divisions of the Darjeeling parliamentary constituency in West Bengal. The CPI-M submitted a memorandum to the poll panel in the wake of pro-Gorkhaland activists Monday greeting the CPI-M candidate Jibesh Sarkar with black flags and 'Go Back' slogans when he went to file his nomination.

April 4th, 2009 NEW DELHI - Criticising Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani for raising the issue of black money stashed abroad, the Congress party Saturday said he was not aware of the legal procedures to repatriate such funds.

March 19th, 2009 ROME - Inter Milan coach Jose Mourinho was fined but not suspended following the dismissal he received at the weekend late in the Serie A game his side won 2-0 over guests Fiorentina. A sports judge Tuesday fined the 46-year-old Portuguese $13,000 'for openly criticising the referee's officiating, stepping out of his designated area'.

February 21st, 2009 GANDHINAGAR - Criticising the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government for 'dividing people on the basis of minority and majority communities', Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) senior leader L.K. Advani said here Friday that the UPA was using caste and religion for nursing its vote banks.