Days after the appointment of Balasaheb Thorat as the new president of Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee, the first meeting with Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) has been scheduled for Tuesday over seat-sharing for the upcoming Assembly polls.
“We will be holding a joint meeting, aimed at discussing the Assembly polls and the strategy on how to go forward,” said NCP’s State unit president Jayant Patil.
On Monday, Mr. Thorat met Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) leader Sonia Gandhi and former party president Rahul Gandhi in Delhi where he reportedly discussed the party’s position in the State and the stand to be taken during the seat-sharing talks.
In the 2009 Assembly polls, Congress had contested 174 seats to NCP’s 114. In 2014, both parties contested independently. A group within the NCP is demanding equal sharing of seats based on the changed political equations as Congress has only one MP from Maharashtra compared to four from NCP.
Both parties however, are far from reaching a consensus on the division of the 288 Aassembly seats as they may have to incorporate several players, such as farmer leader Raju Shetti-led Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghtana (SSS), and Bahujan Vikas Aghadi (BVA), factions of Republican Party and possibly, Raj Thackeray-led Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS).
The SSS has already announced that it will contest 49 seats. Though the MNS campaigned for the Congress-NCP in the run up to general elections it is yet to be officially part of the front, primarily due to previous State leadership of the Congress. Mr. Thackeray’s recent meeting with Ms. Gandhi in Delhi and his meetings with NCP chief Sharad Pawar in the past, indicate that he would be on board for the Assembly polls.
