BJP releases third list of 97 candidates for Lok Sabha Polls; Sushma
Swaraj to contest from Vidisha; Yaswant Sinha's son, Pramod Mahajan's daughtQer
and Former Home Secretary RK Singh also figure in the list.
- Veerappa Moily, KV Thomas, Shashi Tharoor in 2nd list of Congress .
- Notification issued for first phase of Lok Sabha polls in six seats in
Bihar; Notification for five seats in Assam and one seat in Tripura to be
issued today.
- Syrian Parliament approves new election law allowing multiple candidates
to contest for President's post.
- India wins two gold and a
silver in team events of 1st Asian Grand Prix Archery Championships, at Bangkok.
- Saina Nehwal, PV Sindhu and P.Kashyap enter singles quarterfinals of
Swiss Open Grand Prix Badminton tournament in Switzerland.
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The Bhartiya Janta Party, BJP has released the third list of its
candidates for the forthcoming Lok Sabha Polls. The list includes 97 names. The
decision was taken at the party's Central Committee meeting held in New Delhi last night.
Senior party leader Sushma Swaraj will contest from the Vidisha Parliamentary
Constituency in Madhya Pradesh. Ram Kripal Yadav, who recently joined the BJP
after quitting the RJD, will contest from Patliputra against Lalu Prasad's
daughter Misa Bharti. The late Pramod Mahajan's daughter Poonam Mahajan and
former Home Secretary R K Singh also figure in the list. The sitting MP, Kirti
Jha Azad will contest from Darbhanga, while Rajiv Pratap Rudy will fight from
Saran constituency in Bihar. Shahnawaz Hussain
will be contesting from Bhagalpur.
Ramtahal Chaudhary is the candidate from Ranchi
while Jayant Sinha, son of former Union Minister Yashwant Sinha will contest
from Hazaribagh. Sumitra Mahajan will fight the election from Indore in Madhya Pradesh. S.S. Ahluwalia will
be the BJP candidate from Darjeeling in West Bengal.
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The Congress also announced the 2nd list of candidates for 71 seats
after the central election committee meeting in New Delhi yesterday. Union Ministers Veerappa
Moily, K V Thomas, Shashi Tharoor, V Narayanasamy and former ministers Pawan
Kumar Bansal and Subodh Kant Sahai are prominent leaders figuring in the second
list of the Congress. Moily will fight from the Chikkballapur seat in
Karnataka, Thomas from Ernakulam, Tharoor from Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala and
Narayansamy will be the party candidate in Puducherry. On the other hand,
Bansal will try his electoral fate from Chandigarh
and Sahai from Ranchi.
Congress MP, P C Chacko will fight from the Chalakudy seat; Raj Babbar who is
currently representing the Firozabad seat will contest from Ghaziabad while actress turned
politician Nagma will be the party candidate from the Meerut Lok Sabha
constituency. Former Uttar Pradesh Congress Chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi will
fight from Lucknow.
The list includes 10 candidates for Karnataka, 15 for Kerala, 13 for Uttar
Pradesh and 7 for Maharashtra.
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In Assam and Tripura notification for the first phase of the Lok Sabha
polls will be issued today. Polling for five seats in Assam will be held on the
7th of next month in the first phase, which will cover Tezpur, Kaliabor,
Jorhat, Dibrugarh and Lakhimpur.
The Election Commission has set up a toll free phone number 1950 to
lodge any poll related complaint. On the other hand, the Income Tax Department
is also keeping an eye on the movement of cash and other items suspected to be
used for bribing voters.
In Tripura, candidates can file their nominations till the 20th of March
while scrutiny of nomination forms will be held on the 21st of March.
Candidates can withdraw their nominations upto 24th March.
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In Bihar, notification for the first phase of Lok Sabha Election was
issued yesterday. Polling for six seats will be held on the 10th of next month
in the first phase. It will cover Sasaram, Karakat, Aurangabad, Gaya, Nawada
and Jamui. With the issuance of the notification, filing of nomination for
these constituencies has also begun. Candidates can file their nominations till
the 20th of March while the scrutiny of nomination forms will be held on the
21st of March. Candidates can withdraw their nominations upto 24th March. Meanwhile, voters in six Lok Sabha
constituencies of south Bihar affected by Naxalism will get two hours less to
exercise their franchise. Bihar Additional Chief Electoral Officer R Lakshmanan
told reporters in Patna that polling in
these areas will start at 7 am, but will end at 4 pm instead of 6 pm.
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The Chief Electoral Office in Delhi will keep a tab on activities by
political parties ahead of the festive season, for any violations of the Model
Code of Conduct. Chief Nodal Officer, Ankur Garg said, no political parties can
use a festival or a religious occasion to further their political interest or
as a means of campaign. Meanwhile, a total of 70 FIRs have been lodged against
various political parties and other so far in connection with the violation of
the Model Code of Conduct in Delhi. According to the Chief Electoral Officer,
Delhi, these include 10 FIRs each against Congress and BJP and 7 against the
Aam Aadmi Party. Official sources also said that so far 527 hoardings and stick
bills have been removed from the public property and 62 cases for defacement of
property were registered.
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The Election Commission has asked the authorities in Andhra Pradesh to
initiate special measures to keep a check on election expenditure terming it an
Expenditure Sensitive state. Deputy Election Commissioner Vinod Zutshi
yesterday reviewed the poll preparedness with District collectors and SPs in
Hyderabad. Speaking to reporters later, Mr Zutshi said, the authorities have
seized 16 crore rupees of unaccounted cash in the past one week and an
expenditure observer will be appointed for each parliamentary constituency.
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The Convener of the Election Commission of India's Liquor Monitoring
Committee, Santosh K. Mishra, has arrived in Nagaland for reviewing measures
for preventing illegal distribution of liquor during the forthcoming Lok Sabha
elections. The review will be done with all the Administration, Police and
Excise authority today over video conferencing.
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In Syria, the parliament has unanimously approved a new election law
which allows multiple candidates to run for President. The move has opened the
door to other potential contenders besides President Bashar Assad. The
opposition Syrian National Coalition has rejected the move and held the
election law adopted by parliament as illegitimate.
The Presidential election law in Syria is significant
since the seven year term of President Assad comes to an end on 17th of July.
Syrian officials have said that the Presidential elections will be held between 60 to 90 days before the expiry of
the term. President Assad has suggested
he would run again, though he has not confirmed whether he will seek
re-election. Under the new law, only Syrian nationals and those who lived in
Syria for 10 consecutive years can run for President. The new law is based on
the new constitution which was passed in a
referendum in March 2012 in Syria which allowed for a multiparty
political system in Syria and multiple Presidential candidates. Atul Tiwary,
AIR News.
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The massive international search for the missing Malaysian Airliner
MH370 is likely to widen into the Indian Ocean with the US deploying a ship to the
Andaman Sea to locate the airliner. The move came after the US' defence and
aviation experts noted that there was a significant probability of the plane to
be at the bottom of the Indian Ocean. India along with US Navy's P-3C Orion
maritime surveillance aircraft with long-range radar and communication
capabilities will search in the Andaman Sea west of the Malacca Strait.
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A Sri Lankan court in Mannar has ordered the release of 24 Tamil Nadu
fishermen arrested by the Sri Lanka Navy for crossing the International
Maritime Boundary Line. Earlier on Wednesday, 116 fishermen were released by a
Jaffna court. Our correspondent reports that the case of 32 fishermen is likely
to be taken up by Kytes Island court today.
The process of release of Indian fishermen from Sri Lanka
continues. Of the 177 fishermen caught since the last round of talks in Chennai
in January, order of release for 140 have been issued by courts in various
parts of the country. Cases of 32 more are likely to be taken up today. The
matter of remaining 5 may take a little longer as there are some additional
charges slapped against them. The release comes ahead of the crucial second
round of talks between the fishermen, who are trying to come to an
understanding over how to share the scarce fishing resources in an ecologically
fragile region. Options like joint ventures into fishing and deep sea fishing
will be looked into by the two sides when they meet again on the 25th in
Colombo.
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Following the Supreme Court order, the Himachal Pradesh High Court has
asked 137 judicial officers, serving in various capacities in the state, not to
use red or blue beacon atop their vehicles. In compliance with the Supreme
Court order, the Transport department of Himachal Pradesh had issued a
notification on March 5th about the use of red/blue or multi-coloured flashing
lights on the top of vehicles.
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Indian archers have bagged two gold and a silver in the team events of
the ongoing 1st Asian Grand Prix Archery Championships, at Bangkok. In the
Compound Women's team event, the trio of Gagandeep Kaur, V Jyothi Surekha and P
Lily Chanu defeated Iran, 219 to 204 to take the first gold.
In the Men's Recurve, the team of Jayanta Talukdar, Tarundeep Rai and
Kapil clinched the coveted yellow metal by thrashing Taipei, 6-Nil the set
system.
In Men's Compound section, the Indian team of Abhishek Verma, Sandeep Kumar and Rajat Chouhan
missed out on a gold narrowly as they lost to Iran 227 to 232 to settle for a
silver.
The Recurve women's team lost to Japan in the bronze medal match.
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Top Indian shuttlers Saina Nehwal, PV Sindhu and Parupalli Kashyap have
reached the singles quarterfinals of the Swiss Open Grand Prix Badminton
tournament at Basel. In the women's singles, pre-quarter final match yesterday,
London Olympics bronze medallist Saina defeated Sashina Vignes Waran of France
21-7, 21-13 while Seventh seeded PV Sindhu beat Li Michelle of Canada 19-21,
21-16, 21-11.
In the Men's Singles pre -quarter final yesterday, Parupalli Kashyap
defeated Berry no Jiann Tze Wong of Malaysia 21-23, 21-9, 21-14 .
Saina Nehwal will take on Yihan Wang of China while PV Sindhu will face
another Chinese shuttler Shixian wang in quarter finals today. Parupalli
Kashyap will meet Chinese Tapiei player Tien Chen Chou in the Men's Singles
quarter final today.
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NEWSPAPERS HEADLINES
- Stories relating the upcoming 2014 Lok Sabha Polls including seat
allocation to aspiring candidates have been allocated front page space in most
dailies. ''Bansal Sahai win congress tickets despite speculation", writes
the Pioneer. "Differences, ego clashes delaying BJP list for UP",
opines the Asian Age. While the Times of India writes, "30,000 crore
rupees stimulus to economy expected from poll spending".
- In an exclusive titled "Missing file may help babus get away in
coal scam case", the Hindustan Times writes that Bureaucrats responsible
for the Hyderabad based NPPL being allocated two coal blocks in Odisha in 2008
despite misrepresentations in the firm's application could get away as a
crucial coal ministry report that could determine their complicity is missing.
- The Delhi High Court upholding the death penalty awarded to 4 men
convicted of the brutal gang rape & murder of Nirbhaya on December 16th
2012 has been reported by all papers.
- "Spectre of debt stalks Madhya Pradesh again", says the Mail
Today. The paper writes that failure of crops & debt are wreaking havoc in
the lives of farmers of Madhya Pradesh & nearly 2 dozen farmers have
committed suicide this month.
- The Statesman writes that in a surprise move, CBI Director Ranjit Sinha
has advocated the dropping of charges against Lalu Prasad Yadav in the 3
pending cases which are offshoots of the infamous fodder scam, in which the RJD
leader has been convicted in one of the cases.
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