Sharad Pawar opens up on Congress-NCP alliance, formation of Mahagathbandhan for 2019 Lok Sabha elections

The Congress and the NCP will form an alliance for the upcoming Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, confirmed Sharad Pawar.

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Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar has confirmed that his party will get into an alliance with the Congress party for the Lok Sabha and Maharashtra Assembly elections, which are slated to be held in 2019. Taking to microblogging site Twitter, the veteran leader also confirmed that all opposition parties have decided to form a Mahagathbandhan for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

Sharad Pawar said that besides the NCP and the Congress party, other like-minded parties will also be brought together in the run up to the Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Claiming that any differences over seat sharing would be ironed out by the leadership of both the parties, Pawar tweeted in Marathi, “The Congress and the NCP will form an alliance for the upcoming Lok Sabha and Assembly elections. Other like-minded parties will also be included.”

“There will not be any difference over seat sharing, and even if some difference crops up, national presidents of both the parties will resolve it amicably,” the NCP chief further said.

Talking about a joint opposition for the Lok Sabha elections, Pawar said in another tweet, “All opposition parties have decided to come together and form a Mahagathbandhan. Talks are on for the same. Whichever party is more powerful in a state will be given more number of seats.”

This comes more than a month after Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu met Sharad Pawar in the national capital reportedly over forming a joint opposition to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Following his meeting with the Maharashtra strongman, Naidu had said that his attempts and plans were centred around “protecting the nation”.