New Delhi: Congress will contest 174 seats
while its alliance partner NCP 114 and under a seat-sharing
accord clinched by the two parties for next month`s assembly
polls in Maharashtra, capping a week of hard negotiations.
The two parties will also go to the electorate with a
common manifesto and campaign jointly, Maharashtra Congress
chief Manikrao Thakre and NCP leader Praful Patel told a media
conference here announcing the seat-sharing understanding.
They said the two parties would talk to Republican Party
of India and other secular forces to unite against "communal"
forces in the October 13 electoral battle.
Thakre and Patel dismissed suggestions that President
Pratibha Patil had put the two parties in a quandary as her
son Rajendra Shekhawat is reportedly one of the aspirants for
a Congress ticket in the state polls.
"Don`t drag the President into this. The President has
nothing to do with this", the two leaders said.
The seat-sharing accord was clinched after senior
Congress leader and union minister Vilasrao Deshmukh had a
four-hour meeting with Praful Patel and Congress Central
Election Committee (CEC) met again this evening to finalise
remaining seats on which differences were still said to be
persisting between the two parties.
Congress had contested 164 seats and NCP 122 in the
previous assembly polls in the state in 2004.
Bureau Report
