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I am very proud of the hard work that the progressive community put into electing Joe Biden as our next president.

It was in late 1979 when Justice P.N. Bhagwati, in Hussainara Khatoon Vs State of Bihar case, set off the phenomenon that Public Interest Litigations (PILs) evolved to become what it is today. Brought about by a substantial relaxation in the traditional interpretation of the term “locus standii”, the Supreme Court formally defined the term in SP Gupta vs Union of India.

With the appointment of Bheem Rajbhar as state president of Uttar Pradesh BSP, Mayawati has made it clear that it would concentrate on most backward casts to expand its support base for next assembly polls scheduled in 2022.

West Bengal is moving towards a personality clash between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Mamata Banerjee in the upcoming Assembly elections. Both have evolved as cult figures. With no tall state leaders in Bengal, the BJP has followed this formula of a battle between a regional heavyweight and the BJP mascot Modi, in some states, like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Delhi and Maharashtra, and Haryana with mixed success.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: It is, once again, an unredeeming tale of missed opportunities and timing gone terribly wrong.

It is almost a year that the news of first case of COVID-19 in Wuhan in China became known to the world. There has been much research since than about how this virus has grown to spread as a Pandemic. There have been blames and counter blame that this has been grown in China to be used as a biological weapon. But this has not been substantiated with evidence till date. In our country first case was reported on 30th January 2020 in the state of Kerala when a student from Wuhan came back. Laxity and unpreparedness on the part of the government at that time led to several problems and increase in the number of cases.

The National Democratic Alliance (NDA), despite polling almost the same number of votes as the Mahagathbandhan (MGB), has managed to retain power in Bihar. What does this tell us about the state of various political formations in the state?

The perception of Manmohan Singh as a weak prime minister under Sonia Gandhi’s thumb was a major reason for Narendra Modi’s 2014 success. Now, Nitish Kumar has joined the ranks of feeble leaders who are beholden to a powerful partner who will be calling the shots.

India-friendly Joe Biden’s ascendency to the top job in the United States means a lot for India, especially in the area of trade and economic relations as the country is looking for large foreign investments from diplomatic allies to grow its domestic industry and boost employment. Contrary to the official data on sources of FDI inflows into India from April 2000 to December 2019, putting the USA as the fifth largest investor after Mauritius, Singapore, Japan and the Netherlands, nine out of the top 10 foreign companies in India today are from the US.

Every election has a winner and a loser, but the recently held election to the Bihar assembly has only losers. The first major loser has been the Chanakya of Bihar politics, Nitish Kumar who was today elected as the leader of the Bihar NDA legislator party and would eventually take the oath of office.