The Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) will contest 26 and 22 seats, respectively, of the 48 parliamentary seats in Maharashtra, Chairman of Congress’ media cell, Veerappa Moily announced today.
However, differences persist over some seats. The parties have locked horns over two seats in the Marathwada region. The Congress wants Osmnabad in lieu of Jalana, while the NCP is ready to give Raver in the Northern Maharashtra in exchange for Jalana.
The Congress is trying to pressurise the NCP to vacate its claim on Osmnabad from where the NCP candidate lost during the 2004 Lok Sabha polls by just 1,600 votes. Former chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh wants to contest from this seat.
Deshmukh cannot contest from Latur, his home turf, as it has been reserved for scheduled caste (SC) after the delimitation. Neighbouring Osmnabad, which was a reserved constituency is now an open seat.
The NCP and Congress have also agreed to swap the SC reserved seats of Amravati and Shirdi. The seat will be left open for the Republican Party of India (RPI). Talks between the two parties could not make headway for a long time as the parties were reluctant to stray from the earlier positions.
The Congress got an opportunity to pin down NCP after it declared Sharad Pawar as its prime ministerial candidate. This gave Congress an opportunity to press for NCP’s support to Manmohan Singh as the prime ministerial candidate. The party even threatened to go solo in the elections. After Pawar clarified on Thursday that he had no ambitions for the top post, a deal was expected.