)
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiv Sena on Friday widened their coalition for the election to the 288-member Maharashtra Legislative Assembly ,slated for October.
The decision was taken at a meeting between the two parties to discuss seat sharing. The parties will meet again on Monday.
The BJP did not snap its 28-year alliance with the Sena after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the new BJP president, Amit Shah, shot down demands for going it alone in the Maharashtra Assembly elections. Modi and Shah instead asked state BJP leaders to strengthen the alliance with the objective of ending the 15-year Congress-Nationalist Congress Party regime in the state. The Congress and NCP are bickering over their alliance.
Also Read
“The Sena-BJP alliance is intact. At the meeting it was also decided that the Sena, BJP, Republican Party of India, Swabhimani Shetkari Party, Rashtriya Samaj Party and Shiv Sangram will contest the Assembly elections as a grand alliance. The seat sharing arrangement will apply to the larger alliance,” Shiv Sena MP Gajanan Kirtikar, who was present at the meeting, told Business Standard.
However, a leader of the alliance who did not wish to be named admitted seat sharing would be a tough task.
“In the 2009 elections, the Shiv Sena had contested 169 seats, giving 119 to BJP. There were no other partners. The situation has changed this time. The Republican Party of India has demanded 35 seats while the Swabhimani Shetkari Party is insisting on 65. The Rashtriya Samaj Party and Shiv Sangram are seeking 20 each,”he said.
Efforts would be made to give significant representation to all allies and winnability would be a crucial criterion, he added.
