After the Bihar win, Narendra Modi confidently declared that the Congress “will split.” It wasn’t a casual post-poll boast. Ever since he arrived in Delhi in 2014, Modi has worked steadily to engineer a rupture in the Grand Old Party. Nearly 13 Congress Chief Ministers or senior satraps — including Ashok Chavan, Capt. Amarinder Singh, S.M. Krishna, Digambar Kamat, Pema Khandu, Narayan Rane, N. Biren Singh and Jagdambika Pal — crossed over to the BJP. At one point, Ghulam Nabi Azad came perilously close to triggering an actual split, but the move fizzled out and he formed his own party.
Today, the vulnerabilities are again visible. State leaders are restless after repeated defeats, and the old guard is frustrated with Rahul Gandhi’s personality-driven style and his heavy reliance on a tightly controlled “core political group.” Ironically, many members of Rahul’s original team — Jyotiraditya Scindia, R.P.N. Singh, Jitin Prasada, Sushmita Dev and others — have already defected. His current loyalists — Ajay Maken, Randeep Surjewala, Deepender Hooda, Sachin Pilot, Gaurav Gogoi, Bhupen Borah — have not been able to restore confidence inside the party.
The new “core” — Sachin Rao, Krishna Allavaru, Harshavardhan Sapkal, Meenakshi Natarajan and others — has failed to deliver. Rahul’s choices in states such as Ajay Rai (UP), Harshavardhan Sapkal (Maharashtra) and Sunny Joseph (Kerala) have left leaders wondering and sulking. The BJP’s calibrated mix of ED pressure and soft landings in saffron ranks keeps the cracks widening. Can the Congress really split now? The answer lies in arithmetic and optics. The BJP knows its post-2024 dip has narrowed the electoral gap, and a fractured Congress is the surest way to block any national challenge before 2029. Yet a formal split is not inevitable. That leaves Rahul Gandhi at a decisive crossroads. Unless he recalibrates the organization and shares real power, Modi’s prophecy may well become political reality.
Governors and Lieutenant Governors typically serve five and three years respectively, at the President's pleasure—but in the Modi era, a select "lucky" few shatter these norms, racking up tenures far beyond convention through single stints or job-hopping across states.
Acharya Devvrat reigns supreme as the Modi administration's ironman Governor, clocking over a decade in office: Himachal Pradesh from August 2015 to July 2019, then Gujarat since July 22, 2019—now with Maharashtra's extra crown after C.P. Radhakrishnan's VP upgrade. Anandiben Patel's marathon run kicked off in Madhya Pradesh (January 2018), then Uttar Pradesh since July 29, 2019, hitting 5 years and 170 days plus as UP's longest-ever Governor. Arif Mohammed Khan (Kerala since September 6, 2019, now Bihar) and P.S. Sreedharan Pillai (Mizoram October 2019, now Goa) both top six years of unbroken power.
Mangubhai Chhaganbhai Patel grips Madhya Pradesh since July 8, 2021, leveraging his Gujarat Assembly Speaker cred for staying power. Lieutenant Governor stars shine bright too: Admiral (Retd.) Devendra Kumar Joshi rules Andaman & Nicobar for 6+ years; Praful Patel dominates Dadra & Nagar Haveli-Daman & Diu plus Lakshadweep for 8; Manoj Sinha just breached five years in Jammu & Kashmir; Ajay Bhalla helms Manipur with Nagaland's bonus portfolio. These super-tenured appointees bring to light a juicy Modi playbook twist: loyalty pays dividends in extended luxury gigs, defying tradition amid political chess.
A Sunday Budget? Govt’s Big February 1 Dilemma
The pre-Budget buzz has begun in North Block, but an unusual cloud hangs low over the 2026 Union Budget: will there even be a February 1 Budget this time? The date that has become a Narendra Modi–era ritual now poses a bureaucratic headache — because February 1, 2026, is a Sunday. Since Arun Jaitley rewrote Budget tradition in 2017, February 1 has been sacrosanct. But Parliament doesn’t sit on Sundays, government offices stay shut, and global markets are closed. Should the Finance Minister walk into Parliament on a locked-down Sunday — or push the Budget to February 2?
Adding a twist, Guru Ravidas Jayanti also falls on February 1, but the Centre has notified it as a restricted holiday, meaning offices can remain open. So the religious-calendar hurdle is minor. The real question is: will the Modi government break its own February 1 streak?
The Cabinet Committee on Parliamentary Affairs is expected to announce the Budget Session schedule in early January. Bureaucrats whisper that either North Block or Parliamentary Affairs may soon step in with a clarification. History suggests the government could brazen it out. Budgets have been presented on Saturdays — even on a Sunday in 1999. But with no official word yet, Delhi’s power corridors are abuzz: Is India heading for its first Sunday Budget in the Modi era — or a rare date shift?
Akhilesh Yadav’s Big Moment
The Mahagathbandhan may have lost Bihar and Rahul Gandhi may have been facing the wrath of the INDIA bloc parties once again. But in contrast, the SP chief Akhilesh Yadav is drawing unusually positive attention as Akhilesh campaigned in helicopters across the state for many days though SP was not given a single seat in Bihar. His role in keeping the INDIA bloc together is also being appreciated. Even in Haryana, the Congress did not give any seat to SP and yet Akhilesh, unlike the Aam Aadmi Party, did not put up candidates to weaken the Congress.
It is learnt that Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin wants Akhilesh to campaign in Tamil Nadu for the “secular-progressive alliance although the Yadav community is not influential there —as in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
