Guru Teg Bahadur:Tegh Bahadur was born in Amritsar in1621 to Guru Hargobind, the sixth Sikh guru, who raised an army against the Mughals and introduced the concept of warrior saints. He was only 13 when he distinguished himself in a battle against a Mughal chieftain.
His writings are housed in the sacred text, ‘Guru Granth Sahib,’ in the form of 116 poetic hymns.He was also an avid traveler and played a key role in setting up preaching centers throughout the Indian subcontinent.During one such mission, he founded the town of Chak-Nanki in Punjab, which later became a part of Punjab’s Anandpur Sahib.In the year 1675, Guru Tegh Bahadur was executed in Delhi under the orders of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb.
Jyotiba Phule: Phule was born in 1827 in present-day Maharashtra and belonged to the Mali caste of gardeners and vegetable farmers. His Ideology was based on: Liberty; Egalitarianism; Socialism.Phule was influenced by Thomas Paine’s book titled The Rights of Man. Major Publications: Tritiya Ratna (1855); Powada: Chatrapati Shivajiraje Bhosle Yancha (1869); Gulamgiri (1873), Shetkarayacha Aasud (1881). Phule along with his followers formed Satyashodhak Samaj in 1873 which meant ‘Seekers of Truth’ in order to attain equal social and economic benefits for the lower castes in Maharashtra. He was bestowed with the title of Mahatma on by Vithalrao Krishnaji Vandekar.In 1848, he taught his wife (Savitribai) how to read and write, after which the couple opened the first indigenously run school for girls in Pune where they both taught.Jyotirao attacked the orthodox Brahmins and other upper castes and termed them as “hypocrites”.
National Party: The Election Commission has recognised the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as a national party and withdrew the national party status of the All India Trinamool Congress, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Communist Party of India (CPI).
Now the country has Six national parties- Bahujan Samaj Party, Bhartitya Janta Party (BJP), National People’s Party (NPP), Communist Party of India (Marxist), Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
Criteria for a National Party Status:According to the Election Commission, any of these three conditions need to be met if a party is to be called a “national party”.
- A party’s candidates in a minimum of four states must get at least 6 per cent of the total votes polled in each of those states in the last national election. In addition to this, it should have won four seats in the Lok Sabha.
- A party should win a minimum of 2 per cent of the total seats in the Lok Sabha. The party’s candidates should have been elected from not less than three states.
- A party is recognised as a “state party” in at least four states.
Benefits of a recognised Party: Recognition as a national or a State party ensures that the election symbol of that party can’t be used by any other political party in polls across India.
- Recognized ‘State’ and ‘National’ party requires only one proposer to file nomination.
- They are given two sets of electoral rolls free of cost.the candidates contesting on the ticket of National or state party get a copy of the electoral roll free of cost during the general elections.
- The National parties receive land or building from the government to establish their party office.
- They can have upto 40 star campaigners while other can have upto 20 star campaigners. The expenditure incurred on the travelling and other expenses of star campaigners is not included in the election expenditure of the party candidate.
- National Parties get the time slot on the national and state television & Radio to address the people and convey their message to the mass people.
- Once recognised as a national or a state party, a political party retains that status irrespective of its performance in the next elections.It loses the given status only if it fails to fulfil any of the conditions for two successive Assembly and two successive Lok Sabha elections.
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