Sharad Pawar led the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Friday declared to contest the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections, which is scheduled for November 28, from over 200 seats.
Senior party leader and Maharashtra Legislative Council (MLC) member Rajendra Jain and the party’s Gujarat unit spokesperson Nakul Singh said, “We are trying to have a coalition with like-minded parties in the state. We will contest more than 200 seats out of the total 230 seats in Madhya Pradesh”.
As the NCP’s preparedness for the forthcoming MP elections gathered momentum, the party also seems to be gearing up for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Keeping an eye on the same, the NCP supremo on Friday, called for a meeting of senior leaders of the party’s Maharashtra unit as “he is keen to finalise or at least shortlist the candidates as early as possible so that preparations for the polls can start,” a party leader said.
“Seat-sharing talks with the Congress are likely to be concluded soon. Except for three or four seats which might be contentious, both parties know which seats they will contest,” the leader furthered.
In the NCP-Congress alliance, the NCP demanded to contest an equal number of seats in Maharashtra this time, unlike in 2014, when NCP had contested 21 seats in the state, winning four, while the Congress contested 27 and won two seats.
While the Congress and other opposition parties are trying hard to project a united front ahead of 2019 general elections, the fact is they are yet to figure out their agenda to fight the BJP ahead of the 2019 elections. While all the parties of the so-called ‘mahagatbandhan’ are internally strategizing their moves, Sharad Pawar is keen on the idea of forging alliances of political parties at the state level and said the prime ministerial candidate could be decided after the election results.
Even as the Congress tries to put up a brave face projecting Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate, NCP supremo had lately brushed aside the idea and expressed happiness over the fact that Rahul Gandhi will be not the face of the Grand Alliance ahead of 2019 general elections.
