Maharashtra polls: NCP-Congress to meet tomorrow to end seat-sharing stalemate

Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Praful Patel on Monday said that his party and the Congress will hold a meeting tomorrow to discuss the issue of seat-sharing for the upcoming Maharashtra Assembly elections.

"I received a call from Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan today and we were told that both the parties must sit together to discuss the issue of seat-sharing. We are going to discuss it with the Congress leaders tomorrow morning," said Patel.

"The Congress party is willing to give us 124 seats, which our party finds unacceptable. Our delegation, which will meet the Congress leaders tomorrow, will reiterate our stand of equal seats," he added.

Patel further said that the NCP does not have a separate agenda and added that every party had the right to grow.

"If anyone accuses us of having a separate agenda, we can do the same. We too want to grow as a party and there is nothing wrong in aspiring that," he said.

Earlier in the day, the NCP had called its Core Committee Meeting in Mumbai to discuss the seat sharing issue with the Congress.

The stalemate between the Congress and NCP over seat sharing is brewing with the latter not willing to contest in less than 136 seats. The Congress has reportedly offered only 125 seats to its ally, keeping the rest of the seats with itself to contest in the upcoming state assembly polls.

In the last elections, of the total 288 seats in the Maharashtra Assembly, the Congress had contested in 174 seats while the NCP had fought from 114 seats.

The Maharashtra Assembly elections are scheduled to be held on October 15 while the counting of votes will take place on October 19.