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LUCKNOW: Biennial elections for 11 Rajya Sabha and 13 Vidhan Parishad polls on June 11 have forced major political parties to keep check on their MLAs to protect from poaching. BJP is being blamed to the threat of poaching and purchase of MLAs as the party has fielded extra candidate in Vidhan Parishad and supported high profile independent for Rajya Sabha.

BHOPAL: The Madhya Pradesh BJP by deciding to back an independent candidate for the Rajya Sabha has added an element of uncertainty in the elections to the Upper House scheduled for June 11. According to the strength in the MP Vidhan Sabha, the BJP can send two members and the Congress one. Originally the BJP decided to sponsor only two candidates but at the last minute it decided to back in independent candidate. It is said that decision to sponsor third candidate was taken at the behest of central leadership.

After having a military logistics sharing deal with the USA only a couple of months back, India preferred to sign agreement with Ukraine for manufacturing of 500 transport planes as well as the supply of gas turbines for Indian warships at the Defexpo India 2016 held in Goa.

The second bi-monthly monetary policy statement of RBI Governor Dr Raghuram Rajan, on June 7 leaves policy rates unchanged, as was expected, given the recent upsurge in CPI inflation with its future trajectory 'somewhat uncertain'.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Groupism in Congress has become a thing of the past, gushed Ramesh Chennithala, in the first flush of having taken over as the Leader of the Opposition (LOP) and leader of the Congress Legislature Party. Ramesh was named for the post as former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy refused to become LOP, having accepted responsibility for the crushing defeat the UDF suffered in the Assembly election.

Controversies are an undividable part of a functioning democracy. They erupt in hordes in election years and play an important role in influencing the course of politics. With eight months left in Punjab Assembly elections, the state is also witnessing controversies which have started polluting the state’s religio-political atmosphere raising the question whether Punjab is heading for the eighties pre-terrorism situation.

If and when Rahul Gandhi becomes the de jure Congress president from his present de facto status, as Jairam Ramesh wants, it will undoubtedly be the first instance of a proven failure in politics to rise to the top of his party on the basis of nothing else but lineage.

It is discomforting to note that India, home of 1.3 billion people, is suddenly faced with a domestic coal glut situation with an annual production of only a little over 600 million tonnes. On the contrary, China, having a population close to India’s, produced 3.68 billion tonnes of coal in 2015 and was crying hoarse that the output was 3.5 per cent lower than the previous year’s production. Coal accounts for 73 per cent of China’s electricity generation, nearly the same as India’s in percentage term. In a way, India’s current domestic coal glut is mainly on account of uncontrolled coal imports mostly by private sector power companies. This year’s pre-budget economic survey put the previous year’s coal import figure at over 212 million tonnes which was over 20 per cent of the country's production that year. India’s coal imports may be down this year, but they need to be curbed drastically to maintain the tempo of domestic production.

China has been a long term challenge for India. Politically, China has been a persistent threat on India’s borders and dampener to India’s relation with its neighbours. Economically, India has become a dumping ground of Chinese goods after the recession in the west and rise of free trade power in South East Asian countries.

The ongoing Rajya Sabha elections are crucial not only for the Congress but for the BJP also. It may change the complexion of the Upper House and bring some of the stalwarts. They include Congress leaders like P. Chidambaram and Kapil Sibal. The BJP has turned the Rajya Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh into a contest, as it counters the Congress attempt to bring Sibal to the upper house. The saffron party has fielded Priti Mahapatra, who runs an NGO and is wife of a businessman called Harihar Mahapatra as the 12th candidate.