Prakash Ambedkar-led VBA moves ahead to join hands with Thackeray’s Sena, wants clarity on MVA

Rekha Thakur, state unit chief of VBA, said that they were open for the alliance with the Thackeray-led Sena, but the decision will be taken after the clarity from the latter. “We will take a final decision once they clarify their alliance with Congress and the NCP,” she said

Mumbai In a significant political development Prakash Ambedkar-led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) has agreed to join hands with Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena. The VBA has, however, asked Sena to clarify their stand on Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) that includes Congress and Nationalist Congress Party, or whether it will be the alliance of just two of them.

Uddhav Thackeray lashed out at the Jain community over meat ban in Mumbai. (File Photo)

Rekha Thakur, state unit chief of VBA, said that they were open for the alliance with the Thackeray-led Sena, but the decision will be taken after the clarity from the latter. “We will take a final decision once they clarify their alliance with Congress and the NCP,” she said.

“We have held two meetings with Shiv Sena leaders in the last few days. Ambedkar and Thackeray held a one-on-one meeting on the sidelines of the programme last week. We are determined to join hands with Sena with the sole intention of keeping BJP out of power. However, we have not arrived at the decision if Congress and NCP are part of the alliance. Congress has been claiming that they want to go solo in the election,” Thakur said.

The talk of the alliance between saffron and dalit outfits began after Thackeray and Ambedkar shared dais at an event in Dadar last week. Thackeray had appealed to Ambedkar to join hands for the ensuing election to keep the BJP at bay. Ambedkar in the same programme had said that the call on joining hands would be taken once the elections were announced.

VBA, an alliance of the smaller groups representing minorities and scheduled castes, was formed ahead of Lok Sabha election 2019. The alliance had polled 6.92% votes of total votes polled in the general elections and dented in the vote bank of Congress and NCP. It led to the defeat of top Congress leaders including Ashok Chavan (Nanded) and Sushilkumar Shinde (Solapur). The VBA candidates had polled more votes than the winning margin of the BJP candidates in these two constituencies. It polled 4.6% votes in the Assembly polls.