Congress, NCP ink pact for 3 bypolls, 6 council seats in Maha

The Congress and the NCP today entered into an electoral alliance for bypolls to two Lok Sabha and one Assembly seats and also half a dozen Legislative Council seats in Maharashtra.

As per an understanding reached between the two parties, the NCP and the Congress will contest the Bhandara-Gondia and Palghar Lok Sabha constituencies, respectively.

The Congress will also contest the Palus-Kadegaon Assembly seat in the Sangli district of western Maharashtra.

Bypolls for all three seats will be held on May 28.

The Congress and the NCP also concluded a seat-sharing agreement for the May 21 Maharashtra Legislative Council (MLC) biennial elections for half a dozen seats from local bodies constituencies with both the parties deciding to contest three each.

NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik said senior leaders from both the parties held talks to finalise the electoral alliance.

NCP leader Praful Patel and the party's state unit president Jayant Patil and AICC general secretaries Mohan Prakash, Ashok Gehlot and Maharashtra Congress president Ashok Chavan took part in the parleys, Malik said.

As per the alliance, the Congress and the NCP swapped Latur-Beed-Osmanabad and Parbhani-Hingoli MLC seats. The Sharad Pawar-led NCP was keen on contesting the Latur-Beed-Osmanabad seat currently held by the Congress.

The Congress has decided to field Suresh Deshmukh in Parbhani-Hingoli, now held by NCP's Abdullah Khan Durrani. The NCP will field Ramesh Karad from Latur-Beed-Osmanabad, where the current MLC is Dilip Deshmukh of the Congress.

The Latur-Beed-Osmanabad segment is important for the NCP as party rebel and former MLA Suresh Dhas is the BJP candidate from the seat.

The elections to the seats from six local authorities constituencies were necessitated as they are going to fall vacant due to the upcoming retirement of three sitting MLCs of the NCP, two of the BJP and one of the Congress.

Representatives from local authorities (like zila parishads and municipalities) will vote in these elections.

The Congress has decided to field Inderkumar Balmukund Saraf from Wardha-Gadchiroli-Chandrapur, Anil Maghodia from Amravati and Suresh Deshmukh from Parbhani-Hingoli.

The NCP has nominated Ramesh Karad (Latur-Beed-Osmanabad), Shivaji Sahane (Nashik) and Aniket Tatkare (Raigad-Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg).

The by-elections were necessitated because of resignation of Nana Patole as the BJP MP from Bhandara-Gondia and deaths of sitting BJP MP Chintaman Wanga (Palghar near Mumbai) and Congress MLA Patangrao Kadam (Palus Kadegaon).

The Congress and the NCP jointly ruled Maharashtra for 15 years - from 1999 to 2014. However, their alliance fell ahead of the October 2014 Assembly polls, which saw the BJP coming to power in the state.

Assembly polls are due in Maharashtra in the second half of 2019.