Politics

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping today held their first substantive bilateral meeting after the Dokalam standoff, which had put ties between the two countries under strain. Modi, who attended the BRICS Emerging Markets and Developing Countries Dialogue earlier in the day, met Xi on the sidelines of the 9th BRICS Summit here. The prime minister, accompanied ...

At least eight ministers – Uma Bharti, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, Sanjeev Balyan and Faggan Singh Kulaste, Kalraj Mishra, Bandaru Dattareya and two others – have resigned since late Thursday night, and sources said more resignations are expected to make way for new faces, including at least two members from the BJP’s latest ally, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal ...

The Supreme Court today said it would hear Congress leader Jairam Ramesh’s plea challenging the Lok Sabha Speaker’s decision to certify a bill to amend the Aadhaar law as a money bill in the first week of November. The matter was mentioned before a bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra by senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who was representing Ramesh ...

The Congress today said Prime Minister Narendra Modi should apologise for demonetisation, describing it as the country’s “biggest scam” which had inflicted “misery” on the people and dealt a “body blow” to the economy. None of the measures that Modi had promised with the ban on high currency notes, put into effect in November last year, had been realised, Congress ...

Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh+ was found guilty of rape by a special CBI court in Panchkula, Haryana, on Friday. He was immediately taken into judicial custody; he will be sentenced on Monday. The Dera head+ was present in court when the judgment was read out. A rape conviction carries a minimum sentence of seven years and ...

With Muharram scheduled a day after Dussera this year, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday asked the people to cooperate with each other and not to fall prey to provocation leading to communal problems. “Some quarters may try to instigate people to flare up communal tension and there are people who may try to take political advantage of ...

Taking “full moral responsibility” for the recent train accidents, Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu today indicated he had offered to resign in a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The minister met the prime minister after a meeting of the Cabinet and left the city soon after, his staff told PTI. “I met the Hon’ble Prime Minister @narendramodi taking full moral ...

The Centre is tackling the Kashmir issue with all seriousness and “good results” have been visible in the last two-three months, BJP president Amit Shah said today. On the border standoff with China in Dokalam, he said the government has already made its position clear. “The BJP government is effectively tackling the Kashmir issue and good results have come in ...

The Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government locked horns with the Centre over how to celebrate Independence Day on August 15 in schools across the state. The state government instructed schools to ignore a directive issued earlier by the human resources development ministry asking education institutions to follow a centre- prescribed format for I-D celebration. The state government took the stand ...

Cracking down on dissidents in Gujarat, the Congress today expelled for six years eight of its MLAs who cross-voted in yesterday’s Rajya Sabha elections. AICC general secretary incharge of Gujarat unit Ashok Gehlot said he has also recommended the expulsion of six of its legislators who had earlier resigned as MLAs. Three of them had later joined BJP. Asserting that ...