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BHOPAL: While the people of Madhya Pradesh are starving for medical oxygen, voters of Damoh provided much-needed oxygen to the Congress by electing its nominee with the margin of more than 17,000 votes. Observers feel that it was not an ordinary victory for the Congress. The Damoh results have numerous implications. By electing Congress candidate, Damoh voters have punished a defector. BJP candidate Rahul Lodhi was elected in 2018 Vidhan Sabha elections as Congress candidate by defeating BJP stalwart Jayant Malaiya. Later at the behest of the BJP he resigned from the Vidhan Sabha, joined BJP and contested elections as BJP candidate. His choice for by-election caused a lot of resentment in the BJP. Malaiya also revolted but with a lot of persuasion he agreed to work for the party.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: It is Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s finest hour. A veritable Left tsunami saw the opposition – the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) and the BJP-headed National Democratic Alliance (NDA) - being blown off the electoral landscape. The remarkable victory in the teeth of adversity and against heavy odds was fashioned by Pinarayi, who has emerged as the tallest Left leader not only in the state but also in the country. The splendid victory – a repeat of the local body election result – could see a new addition to the political lexicon – Pinarayism. In the process, the Chief Minister has created history by winning a second consecutive term in office after helming the state for five years and bucking the trend of alternating between governments every five years.

While Prime Minister Narendra Modi forfeited his national stature to Mamata Banerjee, the constitutional body, Election Commission of India, smeared its own image by denying to furnish the victory certificate to Mamata from Nandigram. Both these entities have the right to vehemently deny that this observation has any iota of truth, but the fact remains that both have become the victims of the unscrupulous politics of Amit Shah.

It’s been a bad week for the BJP and personally for the prime minister. Not only has Narendra Modi been roundly excoriated by the Western media for the Covid crisis in India for failing to first assess and then tackle the situation, his party has faced a comprehensive electoral defeat in West Bengal, belying grandiose predictions of winning 200-plus seats in the 294-seat state legislature.

A spectacular victory for Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress (TMC) in West Bengal must have come as a crushing defeat for the nationally majoritarian BJP, given its targeted capture of this eastern behemoth, in its planned march to "One Nation".

The most important lesson from the results of the latest West Bengal Assembly election is that the state is not prepared to accept religion-led politics. The state would rather suffer inadequate economic development, lack of industry, large unemployment and extortion than surrender to a political rule compromised on religion. The biggest election shock came from voters thrashing the CPM-Congress-Indian Secular Front alliance this time. Supporters severely punished the grand plan of the secularist Marxist party and Congress to tie up with Muslim fundamentalist Abbas Siddiqui’s ISF hoping that the alliance will change their fortune since at least 30 of the state’s 294 assembly constituencies have nearly 70 percent Muslim population and 70 other seats have around 50 percent Muslim electorates.

New Delhi: A veteran journalist Avinash Chandra Saxena, popularly known as AC Saxena or simply AC, passed away peacefully on Tuesday, 27th April 2021 the age of 93 after two months of decline in health due to his heart ailments. He was managing on his own with an alert mind till the end came.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Pinarayi Vijayan-led Left Democratic Front Government (LDF) has received a shot in the arm with all the exit polls predicting a victory for the Front in Kerala.

With scenes of people being taken on stretchers from hospital to hospital, gasping for air, only to be turned away, and left dying on the road, outside hospitals and in ambulances, the ravaging second India is suffering the world’s worst surge of the second wave of Covid. Though there is no national lockdown, local restrictions in acutely affected zones provide disturbing optics of empty streets, shuttered businesses and workers forced to stay indoors, prompting some of them to re-enact a scaled down version of the reverse migration.

The much awaited May 1 has finally come, but not with the fulfilment of the hope that was generated by the decision of the Union Government to start vaccination of all citizens above 18 years of age. Only six states could so far start the inoculation drive while others reported inability to do so primarily on account of non-availability of vaccine doses in sufficient measure. The ferocity of the COVID-19 touched a new high with over 4 lakh new infections a day, with over 3,500 deaths in the meantime. It unquestionably presents a case of urgent modification in India’s vaccine policy.