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The Congress appears to have finally shed its hesitations about making full use of Priyanka Gandhi’s charisma. Till now, it was apprehensive about her appeal overshadowing Rahul Gandhi. But the recent defeats in Kerala, West Bengal and Assam on top of the earlier setbacks seem to have finally convinced the party that there is no point in holding back its supposed trump card.

It is good that the government has finally recognized the urgent need for making India a more open FDI destination to attract MNCs to invest in India as Indian businessmen, always looking for fast buck, are rushing out of the country for a business address elsewhere, including tax havens. The latest government decision giving red carpet welcome to foreign funds and foreign management control in a host of businesses, including airlines, brown-field airports, food retail, single brand retail for cutting edge technology products, defence, small arms and ammunition manufacture, private security agencies, pharmaceuticals companies, DTH services and cable networks among others have come rather late. This country has not seen much Indian private investment in large brick and morter projects in the last 12 years. And, therefore, the government needs to do more to attract large foreign investment fast in a host of other areas, including manufacturing, the core sector, infrastructure such as railways, roads and sea ports, as there is little hope of Indian business houses being prepared to make much investment in these pivotal growth areas with longer gestation period and slower net return on investment.

LUCKNOW: Samajwadi Party national president Mulayam Singh Yadav is facing the biggest challenge from serious conflict within family members which may affect the party’s prospects in the 2017 UP Assembly polls.

The idea of the third front comes to fore when regional leaders get together or the ruling party suffers defeat. This happened when JD-U leader Nitish Kumar became Bihar’s Chief Minister again or when Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee invited state leaders to her sweating-in function.

BHOPAL: The expansion of ministry by the Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan was marked by a bitter controversy. Three factors were responsible for the controversy. First dropping of two senior ministers and last minute denial of berths to some such aspirants who were sounded about their possible inclusion in the ministry. The third factor concerned the inclusion of such MLAs who have questionable background. One MLA who was sworn in, is a defector. He joined the BJP after quitting Congress to safeguard his business interests. The two senior ministers who were dropped are Babulal Gaur and Sardar Sartaj Singh. Both have been dropped because they crossed the upper age limit of 75 years fixed by the central BJP leadership.

KOLKATA: Despite some differences, progress on building an effective energy network between India and Bangladesh has been satisfactory in recent months, according to official sources.

After achieving some amount of success in annexing Assam from the Congress fold in the latest round of state assembly elections, the BJP leadership is preparing the whole hog to improve the Party’s performance in the next round of state assembly elections in 2017 the main focus of which is on Uttar Pradesh. The electoral battle in UP is crucial for both the BJP and its opponents including the Congress, Samajwadi Party and the Bahujan Samaj Party as UP is the largest state in the country having 403 assembly seats and 80 seats in Lok Sabha and the outcome in UP elections, will have a deep impact on the next Lok Sabha elections in 2019.

The Modi Government is currently engaged in creating more hype on its overall economic management unrelated to ground realities like lurking inflation, low investment, stunted growth and poor job creation in its first two years, apart from the severely stressed banking system.

LONDON: The leader of the Labour Party in the UK parliament, Jeremy Corbyn became the first official victim of the UK voting for Brexit. He lost a no-confidence vote among Labour MPs. The party’s parliamentarians voted 172 to 40 against Mr Corbyn’s leadership in a secret ballot on Tuesday afternoon. There were four spoilt ballots in the contest, while 13 MPs did not vote.

Is Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal chasing a pipe dream by trying to seek a referendum on full statehood for Delhi? Should Delhi have a referendum on this issue or will it open up a Pandora’s box? Whether he succeeds or not Kejriwal has indeed started a debate when he tweeted after the Great Britain’s exit from the European Union last week 'After UK referendum, Delhi will soon have a referendum on full statehood.”