Congress accuses NCP of warming up to BJP, both trash charge

With Congress accusing former ally NCP of trying to warm up to BJP, the two parties which yesterday broke their long-standing alliances in Maharashtra, today trashed the charge as "false propaganda" and "insensible logic".
"This has been Congress' false propaganda for the last 15 years. We are a secular party and we don't need a certificate of our secular credentials from Congress, which is spreading such canard out of fear," NCP spokesman Nawab Malik told PTI.
NCP chief Sharad Pawar also said his party would contest next month's Assembly polls independently and will be happy to get support of secular parties.

"So our party has decided to contest this election independently and we will be happy to take support from other secular parties," Pawar tweeted.
BJP too termed the Congress' charge as "insensible logic and reckless argument".
"The question doesn't arise," BJP general secretary in charge of Maharashtra Rajiv Pratap Rudy told NDTV.

"Why should there be a future alliance? I can tell you with certainty that we are going it alone. They (Congress and NCP) are going to be non-existent in the state after elections," he said.
The former Union minister said, "This is an insensible logic and a reckless argument that BJP will go with NCP after polls. Both Congress and NCP are equally to blame for the mess in Maharashtra."

A day after NCP snapped its 15-year-old ties with it in Maharashtra, Congress had alleged its former ally was trying to "get close" to BJP.
"This is not surprising for us because we knew that over the past one-and-half to two months, NCP has been trying to get close to the BJP. We were prepared for this and we were already shortlisting candidates for all seats," AICC media department Chairman Ajay Maken told reporters in Delhi.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan too had suggested the possibility of an alliance between the two parties.
"It is a remarkable coincidence that NCP decided to call off the alliance after BJP decided to split with Sena.

Today's chain of events was swift and dramatic. All of us will have to keep a close watch on the new political combinations emerging from tomorrow," he had told reporters soon after NCP announced the split.