Finance minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday said he was confident that Congress and Trinamul Congress will contest next year’s Assembly elections in West Bengal jointly even though the two parties are going to fight separately in the coming civic polls.
He said that past experience has shown that Left parties gained if Congress and Trinamul Congress contested polls separately in West Bengal.
“I am quite confident that there would be seat adjustment in the Assembly elections... We will be able to have alliance (with TMC) in the Assembly elections,” Mr Mukherjee said.
He said “One cannot come to the conclusion that there would be no alliance just because we did not have alliance in civic body elections.”
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Marandi files case against misuse of law
Age Correspondent
NEW DELHI
Even as the BJP-Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) coalition managed to resolve the political impasse in Jharkhand, JVM leader Babu Lal Marandi on Tuesday moved the Supreme Court raising an important constitutional question on alleged misuse of Article 164 (4) repeatedly in the state with the governor allowing a non-MLA to become the chief minister. Though the petition by Mr Marandi cited three repeated instances of the governor appointing JMM leader Shibu Soren as chief minister with the benefit of Article 164(4), it assumes significance as BJP leader Arjun Munda tipped to be the new chief minister, is also not the member of the state Assembly.
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Ananth is BJP Bihar in-charge
AGE CORRESPONDENT
New Delhi
Senior BJP leader and the party’s national general secretary Ananth Kumar has been appointed as the party’s in-charge of poll-bound Bihar. The appointment of Mr Kumar was announced on Tuesday.
The party also appointed Mr Dharmendra Pradhan, another national general secretary, as the co-in-charge of the state. Assembly elections in Bihar are due in October-November this year.