Two days after the imposition of President’s Rule in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Congress on Thursday announced that the draft of the common minimum programme (CMP) was ready and would be sent to the leadership of the three parties for approval.
The move is likely to speed up the process of government formation, with top leaders likely to meet in the next three days.
All the three parties on Thursday held a joint meeting on the MET campus at Bandra, where their election manifestos were compared, and a draft was prepared.
On Wednesday, the Congress and the Shiv Sena held a meeting in the morning, which was followed by a meeting between the Congress and the NCP by the evening. Both these meetings paved way for the drafting of the CMP.
Senior leaders present
Senior Sena leaders Subhash Desai and Eknath Shinde were part of the meeting on Thursday, which was attended by former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan, senior Congress leaders Vijay Vadettiwar and Manikrao Thakre, along with NCP State president Jayant Patil, senior party leader Chhagan Bhujbal and NCP Mumbai president Nawab Malik.
In a joint late-evening press conference after the meeting, Mr. Bhujbal said the State was going through a very difficult situation.
“At this position, no one is steering the State, except the Governor. The State needs a stable government at the earliest, and as a part of that process, we have all come together, met and drafted the Common Minimum Programme based on which the new government will govern. This will be sent to the leadership of all three parties and once approved by them, the things will move towards forming the government,” he said. Mr Bhujbal said that coming together of three parties mean stopping the BJP from coming to power.
Congress leader Vijay Vadettiwar said no discussion has been held regarding sharing of power. “We are not only concerned about running the government but also about the manner in which it should run. We have not discussed about power sharing agreement. These meetings were only regarding planning the future move of the government,” he said, adding that top leaders of three parties may soon meet to discuss. Earlier in the day, NCP Mumbai chief Nawab Malik had clarified that the Sena will hold the Chief Ministerial post for next five years.
For two days, all three parties held separate meetings leading to speculations that the environment of distrust exists among them. The NCP and Congress have been meeting regularly since the announcement of assembly poll result on October 24. NCP president Sharad Pawar and Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray held a meeting three days ago, where Mr. Thackeray officially sought support from the NCP to form the government. On Tuesday night senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel and Mr. Thackeray met followed by a discussion between state Congress leaders and the Sena chief on Wednesday morning.
