Deshmukh to head Cong poll panel for Maharashtra

Union Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh, who is against an alliance with the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), was today made Chairman of the Congress Election Management Committee, raising questions over the tie-up in the Assembly polls in Maharashtra.

Deshmukh's appointment to the key post by Congress President Sonia Gandhi came on the heels of AICC's statement that NCP needed to accept “new ground realities” during seat sharing.

The appointment was announced by AICC General Secretary Janardan Dwivedi.

Shortly after the announcement, Deshmukh said the party's state election committee was meeting in Mumbai from tomorrow and “We are preparing for all the 288 seats.”

The statement of AICC spokesman Manish Tewari about the “new ground realities” coincided with the remarks in Mumbai of Maharashtra Congress chief Manikrao Thakre that the alliance would be renegotiated, focusing on new parameters for seat-sharing in the 288-member Assembly.

In 2004, seats were distributed in proportion of 164 and 124 for Congress and NCP, respectively. Congress wants a change in this formula, but NCP wants to stick to it.

The talk in Congress is that it is ready to give a maximum of 110 seats. Remaining non-committal on continuing the alliance, Thakre said discussions on a pre-poll pact are going on at the highest level in Delhi.

Deshmukh, a former chief minister, is a strong votary of dumping the NCP and the Congress going it alone in the state elections. He said if need be, the Congress could go in for a post-poll alliance with that party.

Some senior central leaders are also advocating the line of the party going solo. They feel the party should adopt the example of Rahul Gandhi, who revived the party in Uttar Pradesh by going it alone in the Lok Sabha polls.

Incidentally, Deshmukh had also headed the committee during the recent Lok Sabha elections, in which Congress won 17 out of the 26 seats that came its way in seat sharing with NCP.

The NCP had won just eight and suffered reverses in western Maharashtra, a known stronghold of Sharad Pawar.

The findings of a pre-poll survey conducted by the Congress have enthused those partymen who are against a pre-poll tie-up with NCP.

Party sources claim the survey showed the Congress could win 100 to 108 seats if it contested alone, but its tally would drop if it aligned with NCP.

Another Union Minister Sushilkumar Shinde was appointed Chairman of the Campaign Committee for the Maharashtra elections a few days earlier.

The meeting of the Maharashtra Congress election committee is scheduled in Mumbai tomorrow while the NCP's parliamentary board is meeting there today.

Asked at the AICC briefing whether the alliance would take place, Tewari merely said, “I have no indications to the contrary at the moment”.