Congress braces for seat-sharing talks with Trinamool

With the controversy surrounding seat-sharing with DMK now settled, an emboldened Congress is all set to press for an “honourable alliance” with Trinamool Congress in poll-bound West Bengal.

An indication to this effect was available in the meeting of district presidents of West Bengal Congress in the Capital, where there was a clamour that the party should not hesitate from going it alone in the state if it does not get a "respectable" number of seats.

Sources said that a number of district chiefs of the party stressed that the Congress should get 98 seats, which is one third of the 294 seats in the state Assembly.

They are reported to have rejected the view that Congress is a "spent force" there and even contended that it was now emerging with greater vigour after a seven-year rule of the UPA at the Centre.

“Had DMK with its 18 MPs withdrawn support, it could have been difficult to do hard bargaining with TMC which has 19 MPs in Lok Sabha. Now we have greater leverage to talk seat sharing with the ally and put forth our demands openly,” a Congress leader said here today.