Congress concedes MLC seat to poll partner NCP
Move seen taken to keep alliance intact ahead of assembly elections
Mumbai/New Delhi:The Congress party withdrew its nominee for a seat in Maharashtra’s upper house or legislative council at the last minute on Thursday, leaving it to its poll partner the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in a move seen taken to keep its alliance intact ahead of assembly elections.
The seat fell vacant following the election of member of legislative council (MLC) Vinayak Raut of the Shiv Sena to the Lok Sabha, necessitating a bye-election.
As members of the legislative assembly—the lower house—elect MLCs, a candidate from Congress-NCP, which enjoys absolute majority in the state assembly, was certain to win. However, both parties fielded their own candidates, putting the alliance under strain.
In an interview on Thursday, Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan said there was a strong feeling in both parties that each would be “better off" if they contested separately. However, he maintained that no such decision would be taken to satisfy personal egos.
With just an hour left for withdrawal of nominations, the Congress pulled back its nominee Mohan Joshi, clearing the way for the NCP’s state president Sunil Tatkare.
The Congress and NCP joined hands to avoid a division of secular votes; however, at times, the votes of one partner have not been transferred to the other, triggering the clamour to go solo, Chavan said.
However, analysts believe the talk of going it alone is mere posturing, and that neither party would dare to leave in the wake of the drubbing they received in the recent Lok Sabha elections.
In the Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena alliance won 42 of 48 seats, and their candidates led in 231 out of total 288 assembly segments.
Prakash Akolkar, political editor of Marathi daily Sakal , said, “While NCP wants to extract the maximum number of seats from the Congress, the Congress on the other hand, would like to ensure it concedes very few seats to NCP. And that’s why all this talk of going solo from both parties."
In 2009, the Congress contested 174 seats and NCP 114 seats. However, NCP now wants an equal number of seats, arguing it has emerged the bigger party in Maharashtra after the Lok Sabha elections. Two Congress candidates won the elections to the Lok Sabha, against the NCP’s four.
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