Left Front wins 109 seats unopposed in Tripura civic polls

June 1st, 2009 AGARTALA/ UTTARAKHAND - The Congress has won the by-polls in the Bardwali assembly constituency in Tripura. Asish Saha defeated ruling Left Front and Forward Bloc rival Shyamal Roy by a margin of 3,244 votes.

May 19th, 2009 AGARTALA - The Congress will apply the 'Bengal model and strategies' in Tripura to oust the Left Front government from this northeastern state, party leaders said here Tuesday. 'Due to our organisational weakness, we failed to enlighten the people about the misrule, corruption, terrorism and double standards of the ruling Left Front in Tripura and hence party candidates have suffered a defeat in the Lok Sabha polls,' the state's leader of opposition Ratan Lal Nath told reporters.

May 16th, 2009 GUWAHATI - The Congress was leading in 16 of the 24 seats in the northeast followed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in three and the Left parties in two. According to latest trends available, the Congress was leading in 10 of the 14 seats in Assam followed by the BJP with three and the Bodoland People's Front, an ally of the Congress, in one seat.

May 16th, 2009 NEW DELHI - The exit polls have gone wrong yet again. While all the surveys had predicted an edge for the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), they also said the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) would be a close second.

May 16th, 2009 GUWAHATI - The Congress was likely to improve on its tally in the northeast with its candidates ahead of its rivals in 12 of the 24 parliamentary seats, although the party received a setback in Assam Saturday. According to latest trends available, the Congress was leading in six of the 14 seats, while its alliance partner the Bodoland People's Front (BPF) was ahead on one seat.

May 11th, 2009 AGARTALA - After West Bengal, the Congress and Trinamool Congress Monday formed an alliance in Tripura to fight against the ruling Left Front in a key by-election. The by-poll to the Bordowali assembly seat in western Tripura would be held May 28.

May 9th, 2009 KOLKATA - Days ahead of Lok Sabha polls here, the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Saturday accused opposition Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee of faring poorly as an MP and lacking any political philosophy. Addressing a meet-the-press programme at the Kolkata Press Club here, CPI-M politburo member Biman Bose pointed out that Banerjee had mostly stayed away from the sessions of the outgoing Lok Sabha.

May 8th, 2009 AGARTALA - Tripura Chief Minister and Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) politburo member Manik Sarkar is confident that the party's strength in its citadel West Bengal would remain intact despite the Congress-Trinamool Congress alliance. 'The entire country has been looking into the result of West Bengal as the left parties' result would boost the formation of a solid third front government at the Centre,' Sarkar was quoted by the party mouthpiece.

April 22nd, 2009 AGARTALA - Tripura is all set to witness a multi-cornered electoral battle Thursday with 19 candidates, including a woman, from various political parties in the fray for the two parliamentary seats from the northeastern state. Despite a seat-sharing arrangement with the Congress in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress has also fielded candidates for the two seats from Tripura.

April 13th, 2009 AGARTALA - At least eight of the total 19 candidates contesting the two Lok Sabha seats in Tripura were undergraduates while two have criminal cases pending against them, the National Election Watch (NEW) said in a report Monday. There is just one woman candidate in Tripura that goes to the polls April 23.

March 30th, 2009 AGARTALA - Tripura will play a crucial role in forming a third front government after the April-May Lok Sabha polls, claimed a Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) spokesman here Monday. 'As thousands of people belonging to non-Left camps have joined the Left parties over the years in Tripura, the vote share of the CPI-M would further increase in the Lok Sabha elections,' said CPI-M spokesman Gautam Das.

March 25th, 2009 AGARTALA - Despite a seat-sharing arrangement with the Congress in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress will contest alone the Lok Sabha elections in Tripura. The Trinamool Congress Wednesday said it has finalised its candidates for the two Lok Sabha constituencies in the Left ruled state.

March 17th, 2009 AGARTALA - Though it has a seat-sharing agreement with the Congress party in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress said Tuesday it will put up its own candidates for the Lok Sabha polls in Tripura. Tripura Trinamool Congress chairman Arun Chandra Bhowmik told reporters: 'We will fight the Congress and the ruling Left Front in Tripura and we are likely to form an alliance with tribal based parties.' Meanwhile, the tribal-based Indigenous Nationalist Party of Tripura (INPT) and the Party for Democratic Socialism (PDS), a local party formed by breakaway leaders of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), have announced their support to the Congress.

March 11th, 2009 AGARTALA - The Congress and the Trinamool Congress are likely to put up candidates against each other in the two Lok Sabha seats in Tripura even as they forge an alliance in West Bengal. 'We have shortlisted seven names for the two seats in Tripura and decided to form a tie-up with two tribal-based parties,' Arun Chandra Bhowmik, chairman of the Trinamool Congress in Tripura, told journalists Wednesday.

March 4th, 2009 AGARTALA - The ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) led Left Front in Tripura Tuesday renominated the two sitting Lok Sabha MPs to contest the April 23 parliamentary elections. 'Khagen Das and Bajuban Reang, both CPI-M central committee members, would contest from the west Tripura and east Tripura (ST) Lok Sabha constituencies respectively,' said Bijon Dhar, CPI-M state secretary.