Assembly Elections 2021 Live Updates:
Polls are to be held for 294 seats in West Bengal, 234 seats in Tamil Nadu, 140 seats in Kerala, 126 seats in Assam and 30 seats in Puducherry.Assembly Elections 2021 Highlights: The Congress Saturday released its first list of candidates 13 for the West Bengal elections. Earlier in the day, the BJP also released its first list of 57 candidates for the West Bengal Assembly elections later this month. The saffron party has pitted ex-TMC leader Suvendu Adhikari against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Nandigram.
Activist Akhil Gogoi, who is in jail since December 2019, will contest the upcoming elections in Assam as a candidate of his newly-floated political party Raijor Dal. Gogoi, who was booked under the stringent UAPA during the protests against the CAA in December 2019, will contest from Sibsagar, PTI reported.
Ahead of the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls, the ruling AIADMK allotted 20 seats as well as the Kanyakumari Lok Sabha seat to its ally BJP after several rounds of negotiations. In a statement, signed by AIADMK leaders O Panneerselvam and K Palaniswami, the party pledged full support to the candidates of the BJP in the polls.
Following a complaint by the Trinamool Congress earlier this week, the Election Commission has directed the Union Government to stop using images of PM Narendra Modi on Covid-19 vaccination certificates in poll-bound states.
Sources said the EC wrote to the Health Ministry on Friday reiterating its standing instructions against promoting the party in power through government means when the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) was in force.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee
Congress got 25 seats to fight from in Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, apart from 1 Lok Sabha and 1 Rajya Sabha. The party has sealed its poll deal with DMK.
AICC on Saturday released a list of 40 candidates for various constitutencies from 71 to 126 in Assam Assembly elections.
The Congress has released its first list of candidates 13 for the West Bengal elections.
With the BJP on Saturday announcing Suvendu Adhikari's candidature from the Nandigram seat, the stage is set for the Battle Royale between him and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in the most high-profile constituency in the upcoming West Bengal assembly elections.
Nandigram -- the cradle of the anti-land acquisition movement that catapulted Banerjee to power in 2011, will witness her once protg Suvendu Adhikari taking on her on April 1, in the second of the eight phases of polling.
The 66-year-old TMC supremo, while announcing the party's candidate list on Friday, reaffirmed her name from Nandigram.
She had declared in January that she will contest the seat in Purba Medinipur district. (PTI)
At a time when the Congress is locked in a bitter tussle with the DMK over seat sharing in Tamil Nadu, trouble is brewing in the party in Assam as well over allocation of seats to partner AIUDF.
There were tense scenes and slogan shouting by a section of the party workers at the Congress office Saturday in Guwahati in the presence of party chief Ripun Bora and Mahila Congress national president Sushmita Dev. Sources said Dev is upset over allocation of some seats to the AIUDF in her stronghold of Barak Valley.
Of the 15 Assembly seats in Barak Valley, comprising Cachar, Karimganj and Hailakandi districts , the Congress had won three last time, while the AIUDF had won four. All the three seats in Hailakandi were won by AIUDF last time and the party is claiming all three as part of the seat-sharing deal.
Sources said the Congress leadership has agreed to allocate all the three seats to the AIUDF. This has angered the Congress workers in the district. Read this report by Manoj C G
The BJP Saturday released its first list of 57 candidates for the West Bengal Assembly elections later this month. The saffron party has pitted ex-TMC leader Suvendu Adhikari against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in Nandigram.
Former Indian cricketer Ashoke Dinda, ex-IPS officer Bharati Ghosh among BJP candidates for West Bengal polls.
Senior BJP leader and Home Minister Amit Shah will be on a day-long political tour of the poll-bound states of Tamil Nadu, where he is set to launch a door-to-door campaign, and Kerala on Sunday.
A party statement said Shah will also address the valedictory function of the BJP's "Kerala Vijay Yatra" in Thiruvananthapuram, besides attending several programmes in the two southern states.
Besides launching "Vetri Kodi Eandhi" (people outreach programme for poll victory) at Suchindram in Kanyakumari, Shah will also hold a roadshow in the constituency where the BJP is also contesting the Lok Sabha bypoll due to the death of the sitting Congress MP. Former union minister Pon Radhakrishnan is its candidate. (PTI)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will sharpen BJP's campaign for the high-octane assembly elections in West Bengal with a mega rally at the Brigade Parade Grounds here on Sunday.
The Prime Minister's Sunday rally is said to be culmination of the "Parivartan Yatra" launched by the saffron party in the poll-bound Bengal in February this year. Along with Modi several top senior BJP leaders will be present at the rally.
According to BJP sources, the rally might also throw up surprises as a few noted personalities including Bollywood actor Mithun Chakraborty might be present on the dais. "He may be present at the rally tomorrow. Let's see what happens," a senior BJP leader said.
BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, however, said nothing has been discussed regarding Chakraborty's joining the saffron camp. (PTI)
Activist Akhil Gogoi, who is in jail since December 2019, will contest the upcoming elections in Assam as a candidate of his newly-floated political party Raijor Dal. Gogoi, who was booked under the stringent UAPA during the protests against the CAA in December 2019, will contest from Sibsagar, PTI reported.
Announcing the list of 17 candidates that the party fielded in the first two phases, Raijor Dal working president Bhasco De Saikia said that Gogoi, the party's president, will contest from the Sibsagar constituency in Upper Assam.
In the first phase, the party will contest in 12 seats but is yet to announce the candidate for one seat, and in the second phase, it has put up candidates in six constituencies.
"We have decided to contest in only 17 seats with th intention of not dividing the votes so that the BJP is defeated and to ensure that there is an anti-CAA government in the state," Saikia said. (PTI)
The Congress on Saturday said that its women's wing chief Sushmita Dev was with the party, dismissing reports in a section of the press that she has resigned amid differences over seat-sharing.
The reports of Dev's resignation came amid differences with party leaders over seat-sharing with AIUDF.
"It has been brought to the notice of the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee that a speculative news about resignation of President, All India Mahila Congress Ms Sushmita Dev is doing the rounds on television and web portals. We want to make it clear that Ms Sushmita Dev has not resigned from the party," party spokesperson Bobbeeta Sharma said in a statement.
Earlier, Dev barged out of a Congress meeting on the selection of candidates at a city hotel, party sources said.
Her supporters also demonstrated against Congress leaders who favoured allotting more seats to AIUDF in the Barak Valley. (PTI)
In poll-bound Assam, the campaigns of both the BJP and Congress could not be more different. Yet, one place figures prominently in the campaign trails of both parties — the Bartadrava Than/Sattra (monastery) in Nagaon, which is the birthplace of renowned Vaishnavite saint-reformer Srimanta Sankardeva.
Last month, Home Minister Amit Shah launched a beautification project there, earmarking Rs 188 crore for its development. Just a few weeks before that, the Congress launched a bus yatra — as part of their Assam Basaon Ahok (Come Let’s Save Assam) campaign — from the same place. That is not all.
It is common to see politicians often going to different Sattras to seek blessings or extolling the virtues of Sankardeva, especially in the run-up to elections. In fact, part of Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi’s Assam itinerary last week included a visit to Letekupukhuri Than in Lakhimpur, the birthplace of Srimanta Madhavdev, the most trusted disciple of Sankardeva. Read this report by Tora Agarwala
Upset over not being nominated this time, TMC's Shibpur MLA Jatu Lahiri announced on Saturday that he has resigned from the party.
Talking to reporters, Lahiri said that despite being a "loyal soldier" of the TMC he was ignored by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee.
"More than not getting the nomination, I am hurt that an outsider having no links with the electorate has got the nomination just days after being inducted into the party. It seems we are not required by the TMC anymore. I am leaving the organisation," he said.
TMC has nominated former cricketer Manoj Tiwary from the Shibpur seat in Howrah.
Lahiri, a veteran politician, also hinted that he may join the BJP. (PTI)
On the eastern fringes of Kochi, in the village of Kizhakkambalam, the parking field of a sprawling supermarket was jam-packed with cars, two-wheelers and auto-rickshaws. A line of people, mostly women, flitted out of the supermarket every few minutes, carrying large bags laden with groceries, fruits and vegetables.
This is no ordinary supermarket. Here, a 10-kilogram pack of brown matta rice costs just Rs 84, down from over Rs 450 in the open market. Half-a-litre of milk costs Rs 5, 250 grams of tea Rs 14 and a pack of six eggs comes to Rs 9. When prices of essential food items are so heavily subsidised with discounts ranging from 30% to 70%, who wouldn’t line up to buy?
The bhakshya-suraksha supermarket in Kizhakkambalam, started in 2017, has been one of the flagship initiatives of Twenty20, the charitable arm of garment exporter KITEX Group which has its headquarters in the village. In 2015, after running into a tussle with local politicians, Twenty20 decided to test the electoral waters. It contested in the local body elections that year, winning 17 of the 19 wards. Kizhakkambalam made headlines; it was the first time in India’s history that a corporate firm-backed party captured power of a local body.
Read this report by Vishnu Varma
Trinamool Congress and Left candidates kick-started their campaigns for the West Bengal elections on Saturday.
While the TMC announced the list of candidates for 291 seats on Friday, the Left named nominees for 39 seats that are going to polls in the first phase.
TMC's Ashokenagar candidate Dhiman Roy began door-to-door campaigning in the morning. The party's Jadavpur candidate Debabrata Majumdar also visited the voters in the area.
CPI(M)'s Jhargram nominee Madhuja Sen Roy also campaigned in her constituency.
In Behala, TMC supporters were seen busy painting wall graffitis in the support of the party's two candidates from the area -- Partha Chatterjee (Behala West) and Ratha Chatterjee (Behala East). (PTI)
West Bengal BJP releases the election campaign song 'Gorbo Sonar Bangla'.
Denying reports of senior Congress leader Sushmita Dev's resignation from the party, Assam Congress MP Pradyut Bordoloi said: 'She is very much with us. She is a very indispensable part of Congress. She is a very respected leader of our party.' (ANI)
Former TMC MP Dinesh Trivedi, who resigned from the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress last month, joined the BJP in the presence of the saffron party's president JP Nadda.
To make new women voters aware of how to take part in the voting process, the Cachar district administration in south Assam is taking various steps to attract all electors, especially young voters, to cast their ballot in the upcoming Assembly hustings. Under this effort, a mock polling centre 'Poll Express' has been put into motion, said a district administration release on Friday.
Cachar Deputy Commissioner Keerthi Jalli, DIG Southern range Devajyoti Mukherjee and Superintendent of Police Bhanwar Lal Mina inaugurated the 'Poll Express' which will mainly travel to the border areas and rural areas of the district.
Demos of the voting process will be shown to the general public through the vehicle with new voters encouraged to cast their votes under the SVEEP initiative in Cachar district. (PTI)
Discontent is brewing in the Trinamool Congress (TMC) after it dropped 27 MLAs, including ministers Amit Mitra, Purnendu Basu and Rabindranath Bhattacharya, from the list and introduced 114 new faces.
After Chief Minister and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee released the list of 291 candidates, many leaders criticised the party for sidelining them, and protests broke out at various places.
Sensing rebellion, Banerjee at a press conference on Friday said the leaders who were dropped because of age or other reasons would be accommodated in the proposed Legislative Council or given organisational work.
Some of the veteran TMC leaders who could not find their names in the list included finance minister Mitra; ministers Basu and Bhattacharya; former deputy Assembly speaker Sonali Guha; and veteran MLAs Braja Majumder, Jatu Lahiri and Manish Gupta.
Bhattacharya’s Singur seat, closely associated with the TMC’s rise to power, has gone to state minister Becharam Manna. Read our report here.
The ruling AIADMK has allotted 20 Assembly constituencies and the Kanyakumari Lok Sabha seat to its ally BJP for the April 6 Assembly elections, after several rounds of negotiations.
Following up with the release of its first list of six candidates for the polls on Friday, the AIADMK firmed up the electoral agreement with the Saffron party late Friday night. An AIADMK release pledged its full support to the candidates of the BJP in the polls and the pact was signed by O Panneerselvam and K Palaniswami from the ruling party side and the saffron party's national general secretary, C T Ravi and state unit chief L Murugan.
Days ago, the AIADMK concluded seat-sharing with the Pattali Makkal Katchi and allotted it 23 seats. Out of the 234 assembly seats, the AIADMK is keen to contest from at least 170 seats including 134 it won during the 2016 polls, sources said. The negotiations on seat-sharing, initated in a meeting between BJP top leader Amit Shah and AIADMK's Palaniswami and Panneerselvam here was taken forward by Ravi, and poll in charge for Tamil Nadu, G Kishan Reddy with the leadership of the state's ruling party. (PTI)
The reason behind expelled AIADMK general secretary V K Sasikala’s decision to withdraw from politics is a mystery. However, her move has left her nephew T T V Dhinakaran and his party, the Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK), in a spot of bother ahead of the upcoming Assembly polls in Tamil Nadu.
In 2018, Dhinakaran had launched the AMMK as a result of Sasikala’s ouster in order to recapture the AIADMK from its current leadership, and Sasikala, after her recent release from prison, had no second thoughts in declaring her decision to campaign for the polls.
However, ever since Sasikala announced on Wednesday her decision to withdraw from politics, Dhinakaran hasn’t done much political work, sources close to the AMMK leader said.
“He was neither talking to other parties nor to senior faces in his own camp,” said a source. “It is a fact that AMMK received over 1,300 applications from people to contest in the upcoming elections. But all of them made those applications before Sasikala made her announcement to withdraw from politics. And Dhinakaran himself seems to have no plans right now. If he has to go ahead on his own, it is going to be a lone battle as there are no alliance parties left for him.” Read the report here.
The deadlock in the seat-sharing negotiations between the DMK and Congress for the Tamil Nadu Assembly polls appeared to be clearing and there were signs of progress on Thursday, said sources in both parties.
Congress leaders, however, said a final understanding is expected to be reached following a telephonic conversation between DMK chief M K Stalin and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
According to the sources, both sides appear to be softening their stand. Earlier, the Congress had been demanding 34 seats and DMK was not willing to offer more than 18, but the former is now asking for 30 and the DMK is ready to offer 20, said the sources.
“We assume that a critical point has been crossed and hope that there will be an agreement soon with at least 24 seats for the Congress,” said a Congress leader. Read the report here.
The Election Commission (EC) has asked the Union government to stop using Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s picture on Covid-19 vaccination certificates in states headed to Assembly elections. The EC’s order came on a complaint by the Trinamool Congress this week.
Sources said the EC wrote to the Health Ministry on Friday reiterating its standing instructions gainst promoting the party in power through government means when the Model Code of Conduct (MCC) was in force.
The Ministry was instructed to implement the instructions with regard to the vaccination certificates being distributed in West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and Puducherry.
The EC’s decision came after the Health Ministry, in its reply to the panel, said the vaccination drive was an ongoing government initiative that had started much before the MCC came into force a week ago. Read the report here.
Hello and welcome back to our election blog. We bring you all the latest updates on the upcoming assembly elections in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry here. Stay tuned!
Amid the high-pitched campaign in West Bengal, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has asked his party colleagues to see to it that the BJP does not indulge in name-calling or abuses and keep the campaigning positive, according to sources.
Modi, who collected “the real picture at the ground” with one-to-one meetings with leaders on Thursday evening at party headquarters, urged them to ensure that the narrative in the party’s campaign is not vitiated, sources added. Read More
An alliance deal was signed between the DMK chief MK Stalin and CPI state secretary Mutharasan for the upcomimg Tamil Nadu Assembly elections. the CPI has been given six seats in the alliance. So far, the DMK has allotted 17 seats to its allies.
Speaking on the development, Mutharasan said his party has settled for lesser seats as they believe ideology is more important than getting more seats.
Rejecting allegations of the Trinamool Congress that Deputy Election Commissioner in-charge of West Bengal Sudeep Jain is “biased”, the Election Commission on Friday said it has “full faith in the integrity and fairness” of the senior official.
The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) in West Bengal had on Thursday demanded the removal of Jain, accusing him of being biased against it and breaking norms of the federal structure. Read More
The alliance of the Left Front, Congress and the newly formed Indian Secular Front (ISF) on Friday announced the names of constituencies from where each party will contest for the first two phases of the assembly election in West Bengal.
The Left Front also announced the candidates for the seats allotted to it. However, LF chairman Biman Bose said that consensus on some seats is yet to be arrived at by the alliance partners.
Kerala BJP chief K Surendran on Friday said he had not made any announcement on party's chief ministerial candidate for the upcoming assembly elections in the state.
He added that what he expressed was that people and party workers wanted E Sreedharan to "lead" them. Read More
Releasing the list of Trinamool Congress (TMC) candidates for the upcoming West Bengal Assembly elections, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Friday said she would be contesting the polls from Nandigram constituency and vacate her seat of Bhawanipore in Kolkata. With this announcement, it is likely that the BJP would pit former TMC leader and state minister Suvendu Adhikari against her in Nandigram. Read More
Amid exodus of a number of public representatives and workers, another Trinamool Congress MLA Samir Chakraborty said on Friday that he would not like to contest the West Bengal assembly elections.
The TMC leadership said that they will talk to Chakraborty on the issue. "I have informed party supremo (Mamata Banerjee) that I don't want to contest the elections but will campaign for the party," Chakraborty said in a Facebook post.
Chakraborty, a first time MLA from Taldangra constituency in Bankura district, is a familiar face in vernacular television news channel talk shows representing the TMC's views on various issues. (PTI)
The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) on Friday released its first list of candidates for the upcoming Tamil Nadu Assembly elections. Chief Minister Edapaddi K Palaniswamy will contest the polls from Edapaddi, while his deputy, O Panneerselvam is standing from Bodinayakanur.
D Jayakumar will contest from Royapuram, C V Shanmugam from Villupuram, S P Shanmuganathan from Srivaikuntam, and S Thenmozhi from Nilakottai (SC).The party's list is the first of six that will be released ahead of the one-phase election on April 6.
THE MALANKARA Orthodox Syrian Church on Thursday urged its followers to vote for BJP leader R Balashankar, whose intervention saved a 1,000-year-old church in Kerala’s Alappuzha district from demolition to widen a national highway.
Acknowledging the timely intervention of Balashankar, co-convener, BJP national training programme, in preventing the demolition of St George Orthodox Church at Cheppad, spokesperson for the Orthodox Church, Fr Johns Abraham Konat, said Church head Baselios Marthoma Paulose II wanted the faithful to keep away partisan political interests to vote for Balashankar.
“If Balashankar is not voted to victory, it would be ungratefulness. The Prime Minister had intervened in the issue of the Cheppad church, which was subsequently handed over to the Archaeology department and thus froze the decision to demolish the church. It was Balashankar who gave courageous leadership in this effort to protect the historical church,” Fr Konat said. Read the full report here.
Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala has said that party will come to a decision about seat-sharing ahead of the Kerala Assembly Elections by tomorrow. "For candidates' list, the screening committee will meet and go to Delhi for the Central Election Committee (meet)," he told ANI.
BJP leader and former state minister Suvendu Adhikari has told the central leadership that he is keen to contest the Nandigram seat against Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, according to a senior party leader.
Adhikari had won the seat in the 2016 Assembly polls while Banerjee emerged victorious from the Bhabanipur Assembly segment in Kolkata.
According to BJP leader and former state minister Rajib Banerjee, Adhikari on Thursday told senior party leaders during an election committee meeting held at party’s national president JP Nadda’s residence that he was ready for Nandigram.
The final decision on his candidature will be taken by the BJP’s central election committee (CEC), which met in the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other top BJP leaders. Read the full report here.
Ahead of the upcoming assembly elections in Tamil Nadu, Congress leader Verappa Moily said seat-sharing talks between his party and the DMK are presently underway and would be finalised either "today or tomorrow". (ANI)
"The list will be out soon. Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) is our long-standing partner. There is a new party called UPPL (United People's Party Liberal), which has done very well in the Bodoland area & we are in discussions with them," Assam BJP in-charge and party Vice President Baijayant Jay Panda told ANI.
The Trinamool Congress' Election Committee meeting is slated to take place on Friday at Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's residence in Kolkata, sources told ANI. Following the meeting, Banerjee is likely to release the first list of candidate list for all 294 seats for the West Bengal Assembly election.
The West Bengal Chief Minister had on January 18 announced that she would contest from Nandigram as well as Bhowanipur seats. On February 20, the incumbent TMC launched the slogan for the polls — "Bangla nijer meyekei chaye" (Bengal wants its own daughter). The tenure of the 16th Legislative Assembly of West Bengal will end on May 30 this year. A total of 7,34,07,832 voters will choose their representative for the 17th Legislative Assembly of West Bengal. (With ANI inputs)
IT IS an uphill battle and the opponent is formidable, but the Congress is more confident than it was three months ago and hopes to give incumbent BJP a tough fight in Assam. For the first time in recent history, the party has tasked its chief ministers with election duties to turn the corner in other states — Chhattisgarh’s Bhupesh Baghel in Assam and Rajasthan’s Ashok Gehlot in Kerala.
And Baghel, sources said, is replicating the Chhattisgarh model in Assam.
His three key advisors — Vinod Verma, Ruchir Garg and Rajesh Tiwari — are stationed in Assam, and over two dozen teams comprising local Congress leaders from Chhattisgarh have been moved to Assam to oversee the election efforts. This is addition to the campaign already put in place by AICC incharge Jitendra Singh, who is considered close to Rahul Gandhi.
Assam Congress leaders said factionalism in the state unit, which was rampant, has been controlled, but they are keeping their fingers crossed since ticket distribution has always been tricky. “He (Jitendra Singh) had taken all of us to a resort some two months ago and we sat together for several hours. His message was very clear. The party will not project anyone as the Chief Minister candidate. Every leader will get a post in election-related panels but how we conduct ourselves while delivering the task assigned to us will decide our fate,” a senior leader told The Indian Express. Read the report here.
The Election Commission (EC) has asked the Health Ministry for the “factual position” regarding the Trinamool Congress’s complaint against the use of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s photo on Covid vaccination certificates.
“We want to ascertain the facts first. For instance, whether these certificates are indeed being distributed on the instructions of the Health Ministry. As a matter of routine, we always seek a response from all the involved parties in such complaints,” said an EC official who did not wish to be identified. According to sources, the Commission has also sought a report from its state Chief Electoral Officer on the matter.
This week, the TMC had approached the West Bengal Chief Electoral Officer alleging that the use of PM’s photo is a “blatant misuse of official machinery” and violates the Model Code of Conduct.
“Prime Minister Narendra Modi happens to be the star campaigner of the BJP in this Assembly elections. As a politician, he is seeking support for his party during rallies. In this situation, using his photo in vaccination certificates is akin to influencing voters and violates the model code of conduct,” state minister Firhad Hakim had told reporters after meeting the election officials in Kolkata on Wednesday. Read our report here.
Hello and welcome to our election blog. We bring you all the latest updates on the upcoming assembly elections in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry here. Stay tuned!