Warring Congress and NCP come together for legislative council polls
After warring with each other after the municipal elections, the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have again decided to come together to contest the upcoming biennial elections to the 10 legislative council seats.
After warring with each other after the municipal elections, the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have again decided to come together to contest the upcoming biennial elections to the 10 legislative council seats.
The decision was taken at a meeting on Thursday.
“We have arrived at a decision to field three candidates each for the six Vidhan Parishad seats (from local constituencies) that will have elections soon,” said Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee (MPCC) president Manikrao Thakre.
While Congress will contest from civic bodies of Osmanabad-Beed-Latur, Wardha-Chandrapur-Gadchiroli and Amravati, NCP will field nominees from Raigad-Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg, Nashik, and Parbhani-Hingoli local bodies.
The two parties have decided to swap Parbhani-Hingoli (with Congress earlier) and Wardha-Chandrapur-Gadchiroli seats (with NCP earlier).
There are also four other seats for the Konkan and Mumbai teachers’ constituencies and graduates’ constituencies that the ruling alliance will contest together.
The parties were involved in a bitter tussle over mayoral elections and standing committee nominations in several corporations including Chandrapur and Thane. However, Thakre said state-level decisions could not be made on the basis of local issues. “Some things have happened in the past, but the Congress and the NCP are running the government jointly in the Centre and the state, and we have always said that like-minded parties should stay together,” he said.
The NCP state party president Madhukar Pichad said their party would re-nominate its MLCs Anil Tatkare for the Raigad-Ratnagiri seat and Jayant Jadhav for the Nashik seat. He said the candidate for the Parbhani-Hingoli seat would be announced soon.
Pichad said they would nominate senior leader Vasant Davkahare’s son Niranjan for one of the other constituencies.