MUMBAI: The opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi on Tuesday decided to iron out its differences over seat-sharing by negotiating the disputed seats for the Maharashtra assembly polls. The broad formula being worked out is 110-plus-5 seats to Congress, 90-plus-5 to Shiv Sena (UBT) and 80-plus-5 to Sharad Pawar led NCP (SP).
After the differences between the Congress and Shiv Sena surfaced, the Congress leadership deputed its legislature party leader Balasaheb Thorat as an emissary to straighten out wrinkles with the Shiv Sena (UBT) over 15 disputed seats.
Thorat, after returning from Delhi, met former Union Minister Sharad Pawar and Uddhav Thackeray and attended a seat-sharing meeting in Mumbai. “In the meeting, we decided that out of 15 disputed seats, five seats will be given to Shiv Sena (UBT) while 10 seats will be retained by Congress.
Most of these seats are in the Vidarbha region,” said a Congress source. “Shiv Sena (UBT) should understand that each seat is important in the assembly election. If they have a strong and good candidate, then only they should demand seats. Otherwise, it will give undue benefits to mahayuti,” said the Congress leader.
Another senior MVA leader, who is a part of the seat-sharing talks, said the Congress would contest 110-plus-minus-5 seats while Uddhav-led Sena will contest 90-plus-minus-five seats while Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP) will contest 80-plus-minus 5 seats. The state has a 288-member assembly.
“Uddhav’s Sena was insisting on more seats in Vidarbha and Mumbai. These are Congress strongholds. The Sena should concentrate on the Mumbai Metropolitan and Konkan regions, its traditional bastions,” said the Congress source.
“Rather than focusing on their own strongholds, they are trying to snatch away our seats. It also shows that Uddhav is not confident of winning the seats in his own bastion against CM Ekanth Shinde-led Shiv Sena,” said the Congress leader.
A Shiv Sena (UBT) leader said that nobody would deny that there was a sympathy wave towards Uddhav in the Lok Sabha and that Congress capitalised it won at amny seats.
“Congress numbers thus went up from one Lok Sabha MP in 2019 to 13 in the recent Lok Sabha elections. But they are now denying the share to us,” said an Uddhav party leader. “Thackeray was the MVA face when the alliance was in power. So, Uddhav should be given a good number of seats, so people’s votes are easily transferred,” a leader said.