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Maharashtra Assembly Elections: Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) Chief Ajit Pawar met Union Home Minister Amit Shah at his residence in New Delhi this morning (Wednesday) and requested for the seat sharing for the Maharashtra Assembly elections to be finalized as soon as possible. In the meeting with Shah, Ajit Pawar advised to finalize the seat sharing as soon as possible and not keep it hanging till the last moment like the Lok Sabha elections. During this meeting, Pawar has demanded 80 to 90 seats for NCP from Amit Shah.
An India Today report quoted sources as saying that Pawar is adamant on fielding his candidates on the 54 seats where the NCP won in 2019. Apart from these seats, Ajit Pawar also wants to field candidates on 20 seats in Western Maharashtra, Marathwada and North Maharashtra where the Congress won.
According to sources, Ajit Pawar wants to field candidates on four to five seats in Mumbai’s urban areas as well. These are the seats which are minority-dominated and Congress has dominated there. Sources said that Ajit Pawar is confident that at the time of elections, three independent and three Congress MLAs will also be with him, so Pawar is also staking claim on seats in their constituencies.
Let us tell you that assembly elections are to be held in Maharashtra in the next few months. At present, there is a Mahayuti government in the state. Under this, BJP, CM Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena and Ajit Pawar’s NCP are in alliance. Shinde Sena is also planning to contest on 100 seats. Therefore, it will not be easy to coordinate seat sharing in the Mahayuti for the 288-member assembly because BJP has also set a target of fielding candidates on 160 to 170 seats.
