A controversial demonstration of the Electronic Voting Machine last week in Madhya Pradesh’s Bhind district last week seemed to lend credence to the opposition’s accusation that voting machines could be tampered with. It is a charge that the Election Commission has strongly rejected more than once this week. And now, a top poll panel official flown into the state to oversee by-polls to two assembly seats over the weekend has […]

It is battle royal in the streets of Delhi. What started as a political brawl is now being dragged to the court. Yes I am talking of the tussle between Finance Minister Arun Jaitkey and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Jaitley has personally gone and filed a defamation suit against AAP’s Arvind Kejriwal, Deepak Bajpayee, Ashutosh and Raghav Chadha seeking Rs 10 crore damages for ‘slander’ and baseless charges in […]

Today, in India’s remote northeastern states of Assam and Tripura, the first wave of the country’s 814 million eligible voters will cast their ballots as the largest election in world history gets underway. Any time the world’s most populous democracy goes to the polls, it’s a momentous undertaking. But with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stepping aside after a decade in charge, analysts say voting will take on an even greater […]

The chemistry and momentum is clearly with a charismatic Modi but will he have the numbers to become India’s next prime minister? For almost three decades, Sharad Pawar has been India’s prime minister-in-waiting. A few years ago, when journalists asked him if he had finally given up on his prime ministerial ambitions, the Maharashtra leader candidly admitted that with a party of less than 10 MPs, his chances for the […]