NEW DELHI: The Maharashtra Vikas Aghadi (MVA) on Tuesday announced its seat-sharing pact for 48 Lok Sabha seats in the state ending weeks of hectic negotiations, underlining that the agreement on the seats had been guided by the “winning probability” of the three alliance partners
The Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) will contest 21 seats, the Congress 17 and the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar), 10, MVA leaders announced in the presence of top leaders Sharad Pawar, Uddhav Thackeray, state Congress chief Nana Patole at the south Mumbai office of Shiv Sena (UBT), Shivalaya.
The Lok Sabha polls will be held in Maharashtra in five phases from April 19 to May 20.
Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole said the party backed down from its demand of getting three seats — Sangli, Mumbai South Central and Bhiwandi — to achieve the larger goal of defeating the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Shiv Sena (UBT) had unilaterally declared candidates for Sangli and Mumbai South Central seats while the NCP (SP) announced its nominee for Bhiwandi, upsetting the Congress which had been hopeful of a good performance on these seats. The Congress gave in after the Sena and the NCP (CP) refused to cede ground on the three seats.
“The Congress is a national party and played a significant role in the independence struggle. Congress leaders and workers are aware of the treatment given to our leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi by this regime of dictators. We have resolved all the issues and our workers should also accept the decision,” Nana Patole said, acknowledging that there will be some heartburn among its party workers over the decision.
Pawar said the three parties had declared the seat-sharing formula by mutual understanding.
On the Sena declaring its candidates from Sangli and Mumbai South Central, Thackeray said there was no harm in anyone expecting a particular seat in the negotiations. “But MVA has finalised its formula based on criteria of winning probability,” he said.
The Congress has been given seven of the ten Lok Sabha seats in the Vidarbha region, three seats each in Marathwada and Western Maharashtra, and two seats each in North Maharashtra and Mumbai Metropolitan Region. Both the seats are in Mumbai.
It is for the first time that Congress will contest only two of the six Lok Sabha seats in Mumbai where it was founded in 1885. They are Mumbai North and Mumbai North Central constituencies.
The Congress hasn’t been allocated a single seat in the Konkan region.
The NCP (SP), on the other hand, has been given five Lok Sabha seats from Western Maharashtra, two from North Maharashtra and one each from Vidarbha, Marathwada and Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR).
The three parties have not left any seats for their smaller allies in the MVA.
Thackeray also insisted that the MVA wanted Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar to be part of the alliance but unfortunately, he chose a different path. “We wanted Prakash Ambedkar to be on our side but it did not happen. Even if he keeps speaking against us, we will not utter a single word against him as we respect him,” Thackeray said.
The MVA leadership also renewed their attacks on PM Narendra Modi who launched the BJP’s Maharashtra campaign on Monday.
On PM Modi’s statement that the Thackeray-led Shiv Sena was the ‘Nakali (fake) Sena’ and the one led by chief minister Eknath Shinde’s the real one, Uddhav Thackeray said that Shinde’s party was the ‘Vasuli Sena’ (extortionist army) and Modi is the leader of a corrupt party.
“If my party is not original, then why did Amit Shah visit Matoshri in 2019 to request me for the alliance? BJP is a cowardly and corrupt party. The way Narendra Modi has given speeches, he is no longer behaving like a prime minister of the country but as the leader of BJP which is now Bhrashta Janata Party. Modi is using government machinery to harass the Opposition and bring all the corrupt leaders to the BJP or with BJP,” said Thackeray.
“BJP is an extortionist party which uses power in the central government to collect funds from corporates through election bonds,” he said.
Pawar said: “The Prime Minister is an institution and I have seen many prime ministers in the past. But except Narendra Modi, no one has brought this much disgrace to this position.”
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