Congress leaders on Wednesday met NCP founder Sharad Pawar, and proposed a formal alliance with his party to contest the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), scheduled to begin from December.
A delegation of the Mumbai Congress led by president Varsha Gaikwad, included Congress MLAs like Amin Patel, Aslam Sheikh and Jyoti Gaikwad reached Pawar’s residence, in the presence of Sharad Pawar’s daughter and NCP’s Lok Sabha MP Supriya Sule.
The Mumbai Congress delegation proposed a formal alliance to contest the forthcoming BMC elections, after telling Sharad Pawar that his NCP is their “natural alliance partner” since they follow almost the same ideology and hence must join hands.
“United NCP used to be our natural ally. Even after the NCP split, it had contested Lok Sabha and Maharashtra state assembly elections in an alliance with the Sharad Pawar-led NCP. Congress always takes along its alliance partners, including smaller parties in Mumbai. Let me also assure you that the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is intact,” Congress leader Aslam Shaikh said.
According to Congress sources, the Congress is willing to offer around 15 seats to the Sharad Pawar-led NCP. In the last BMC elections, the united NCP had won 9 seats, while the Congress won 31 seats.
Meanwhile, BJP leader and Maharashtra Revenue Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule has confirmed that the ruling BJP-led Mahayuti alliance comprising the BJP, Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and the Ajit Pawar-led NCP, will contest the BMC elections together, aiming to get a two-thirds majority with a 51 per cent vote share.
Yet, after Wednesday’s meeting, NCP chief Sharad Pawar has called for a joint meeting of the Mumbai Congress delegation and the Mumbai president of his NCP, to discuss the proposal put forth by the Congress on Wednesday, in further detail, though the Sharad Pawar-led NCP is also in parallel talks with the Uddhav-led Shiv Sena regarding an alliance to contest the BMC and other local body elections.
The development came after Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray’s statement on Tuesday that the Congress party’s earlier announcement that it will fight the forthcoming local civic body polls to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) “alone” would be “suicidal”, and that opposition unity is essential to counter the BJP.
The Uddhav-led Shiv Sena’s Marathi daily newspaper, ‘Saamana’, wrote that unity is needed to stop the BJP plan to “hijack the election system through hooliganism, mob rule, excessive use of money and police force to separate Mumbai from Maharashtra”.
The Congress is opposed to the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv sena allying with the Raj Thackeray-led MNS, since the Congress fears that MNS founder Raj Thackeray’s statements against North Indians and Muslims in the past might ensure that North Indians and Muslims vote against the Congress-led MVA opposition alliance.
The Uddhav Thackeray–led Shiv Sena which ruled the BMC for more than two decades, is determined to retain control and fight against the BJP and the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. Uddhav is in talks with his cousin Raj Thackeray for a possible alliance to fight the BMC polls together and ensure that the Maharashtrian vote does not get split.
If an Uddhav-led Sena and Raj Thackeray-led MNS alliance materialises, Congress leaders who oppose any alliance with Raj Thackeray might distance the MVA from Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena and Raj Thackeray’s MNS.