Election 2019 LIVE: Supreme Court Likely to Hear Plea on Rahul Gandhi's Citizenship Next Week

As Ram Mandir is not the flavour of the election season both for BJP and the RSS, willingly or unwillingly, the pioneers of the temple movement have taken a retreat for the moment.

Supreme Court has asked the Election Commission to decide on pleas for re-scheduling the voting time from 7 am to 5 am in the Lok Sabha election during the month of Ramzan coinciding with the rest of the phases and due to heat-wave conditions in Rajasthan and other areas.

 According to the notice, Gandhi had declared his nationality as British in the annual returns of a company registered at Winchester, Hamshire, in the United Kingdom. The allegation was trashed by his sister, Priyanka Gandhi. "The entire country knows that Rahul Gandhi is Hindustani. Everybody knows he was born, raised here. What rubbish," she told reporters, adding that the notice was born out of "a fear of losing". 

The home ministry had issued a notice to Gandhi asking him to clarify his position after BJP MP Subramanian Swamy claimed that a company’s record showed he held British citizenship

SC Likely to Hear Plea on Rahul Gandhi's Citizenship Next Week | The Supreme Court will hear the plea on Rahul Gandhi's citizenship next week. The petition, filed by two socio-political activists wants the Ministry of Home Affairs to decide questions on the Congress chief's citizenship. The plea also wants Gandhi to be disqualified from the electoral race and have his name from the electoral roll deleted. 

Rahul, Priyanka to Hold Rallies Today | Congress president Rahul Gandhi will be on a campaign trail, canvassing for votes today in Jharkhand and Rajasthan. His sister and Congress General Secretary for UP East, Priyanka Gandhi, too will be on a campaign blitzkrieg in Rae Bareli, where she will be later joined by her mother and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi. 

Former J&K CM Omar Abdullah raised questioned on listing of Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist and asked ‘is this true that he was listed only because references to Pulwama & terrorism in Kashmir were dropped?’ He also tweeted, "It’s amazing how quickly the sacrifices of the CRPF men were sold down the river to get a symbolic win."

The rest of the opposition must be wondering if it will ever catch a break. Every time the BJP campaign seems to be flagging it gets a shot in the arm. The #MasoodAzhar development in the UN today couldn’t have come at a better time for the Modi ji’s re-election campaign.

— Omar Abdullah (@OmarAbdullah) May 1, 2019

"However, here in India, some people were very happily mocking us while we were working towards this day. But I want to tell them today that this is not just Modi's success -- it's the success of the entire country and its 130 crore people," PM said, adding that today should be a "day of pride" for every Indian regardless of ideology in an apparent reference to his detractors in the opposition.

PM Hails Azhar's Listing as 'Big Victory' for India | Prime Minister Narendra Modi hailed the blacklisting of Azhar as a "big victory" in the fight against terror, and claimed that it will serve as the first step in his government's plan to bring the curtains down on those targeting India.  "From now on, whenever the country faces danger of any kind from anybody, we will enter their homes and eliminate them. If they fire bullets at us, we will fire bombs at them," he said at an election rally in Rajasthan's Jaipur. 

China, which had blocked moves to blacklist Masood Azhar four times, finally dropped its objections saying it "found no objection after a careful study of revised materials". The UN decision means a freeze on Masood Azhar's finances and assets, a travel ban and an arms embargo.

Politics Over Azhar's Listing by UN | Politics rages on after the UN Security council on Wednesday designated Pakistan-based terrorist Masood Azhar as a global terrorist. Omar Abdullah questions if the win came at the cost of references to Pulwama and Kashmir terrorism being dropped. Congress belittles the declaration, says Pakistan must come out and return Azhar to its friend Modi

The notice came hours after the poll panel gave clean chit to Modi for his speech in Latur last month in which he had urged first-time voters to dedicate their votes in the name of the Balakot air strike heroes and the soldiers killed in February’s Pulwama attack.

Rahul Gets EC Notice Over Anti-Tribal Law Claim | The clock ticks on Rahul Gandhi's response after the Election Commission on Wednesday issued a notice to the Congress chief  for allegedly claiming at a Madhya Pradesh rally that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has come up with a new law that allows tribals to be shot. The commission has given Gandhi 48 hours to respond to the notice, failing which "it will take a decision without further reference to him"