Pallab Bhattacharya

Trudging across the world’s largest inhabited island (Majuli) on the Brahmaputra river in Assam for three days carrying EVMs, VVPAT units and other election materials, scaling rugged mountains in eastern Himalayas to reach just one voter in Arunachal Pradesh, walking through the deep snow to the world’s highest battlefield Siachen Glacier, where oxygen is scarce, or risking Maoist ambush in a dense forest—these are just a few vignettes from the Indian parliamentary election, a mind-boggling exercise in the world’s largest democracy, that aim to ensure that no eligible voter is left out.

After staying away from the heat and dust of gruelling summer electioneering and leaving the job of fronting the Congress Party’s campaign to her son Rahul and daughter Priyanka, Sonia Gandhi is back to doing what she does best—coalition-building—even before the last votes in India’s parliamentary polls are cast today and results declared four days later. The purpose: to stop the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from recapturing power in the event of a clear majority eluding the saffron party and the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by it.

When polling in India’s parliamentary elections concludes on Sunday (May 19), the entire national focus will be firmly on nine remaining constituencies out of total of 42 in West Bengal even though voting will also take place in some other states, including Uttar Pradesh, electorally the most crucial state.

The federal Indian government has cleared Tripura state authorities’ proposal for setting up a second integrated check post (ICP) along

With Indian parliamentary election having entered the final lap of voting before vote-count is taken up in about a fortnight (on May 23), coalition-building efforts have begun afresh amidst indications of majority being elusive for any particular party or pre-poll alliance of parties.

The Easter Sunday terror attacks in Sri Lanka—for which the Islamic State terror outfit claimed responsibility—have brought to the fore three main disturbing developments that have serious security implications for the entire South Asian region: first, the IS poses an ever-greater threat to the region; second, its relatively new modus operandi is the adoption of the franchise model by helping local outfits to carry out spectacular attacks; and third, radicalisation.

Acclaimed Indian director Shyam Benegal plans to begin the shooting of his much-awaited feature film on the life and works of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Filming for the Bangladesh-India co-production is expected to begin in November this year and be completed by February next.

Polling in 70 percent of the total of 543 seats in India’s parliamentary election is over. After polling began on April 11, voters have chosen their representatives for 373 constituencies in four phases.

It is not just the summer heat that is rising in Delhi with each passing day. The political temperature, too, is shooting up with the battle lines drawn for the seven parliamentary seats which will go to the polls on May 12.

The month-long feverish speculations about Congress Party General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contesting against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Varanasi parliamentary constituency has come to an anti-climactic end. Had it come about,

The last seven months have seen two watershed events in the political history of the Maldives, the strategically-located Indian Ocean archipelago that has since long been a theatre of intense rivalry between Asian giants India and China for influence.

India’s Supreme Court yesterday held an extraordinary hearing after a former employee of the apex court accused Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi of sexual harassment and persecution.

If West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee nurtures larger ambitions to play a much bigger role at the national level after the ongoing parliamentary elections that by most accounts will produce a hung verdict,

Out of power for five years, the Congress Party's manifesto for the coming parliamentary elections in India has done enough to bring out once again its traditional Left-of-the-Centre ideological moorings and project a more inclusive and welfare-oriented organisation after its brief flirtation with a slight tilt to the Right for several months last year.

Rahul Gandhi's decision to contest from a second parliamentary constituency—Wayanad in the southern state of Kerala besides his traditional constituency of Amethi in Uttar Pradesh in the north—in the coming national elections is an emphatic statement of his long-term strategy to rebuild his party and bring it back to power.

When it is election time, nothing pays more than populism. All parties love to woo the poorest of the poor segment of society to strengthen their welfare politics credentials.

The drawing up of a “Voluntary Code of Ethics” by social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and ShareChat and their intermediaries for the coming parliamentary elections in India is a landmark decision in more ways than one.

Ever since India entered the unpredictable terrains of coalition politics in early 1990s, winning parliamentary elections and forming governments have been all about the right alliance partners.

When former foreign minister of Bangladesh (under the previous Sheikh Hasina government) AH Mahmood Ali spoke at a meeting of

Three separate announc-ements in quick succession by bachelor Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee on March 10 and 11