Mumbai/IBNS: The Congress Thursday announced its first list of 48 candidates for the upcoming Maharashtra election, a day after the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi announced an 85-85-85 seat sharing formula between the three key ally partners.
The party has retained 25 sitting MLAs in the first list, which comprised all the confirmed and mostly undisputed seats.
As per the list, the party's state chief Nana Patole is contesting from Sakoli, Legislature Party leader Balasaheb Thorat from Sangamner, Leader of Opposition Vijay Wadettiwar from Bramhapuri, former Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan from Karad South and CWC Member and Regional Working President Naseem Khan from Chandivali.
The Congress was locked into some tough bargaining with ally Uddhav Thackeray's Shiv Sena UBT for weeks before yesterday's breakthrough.
The Shiv Sena faction of Uddhav Thackeray released a list of 65 candidates on Wednesday evening, revealing the seat-sharing arrangement for Maharashtra.
The contentious exercise had concluded after weeks of hectic discussions.
As per the arrangement, the three key partners in the Maha Vikas Aghadi - the Sena UBT, Congress, and Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) - will each contest from 85 seats.
This will take the total to 255. The rest of the state's 288 seats, 33, will go to the smaller allies of the MVA and some may even be divided between the big three.
The announcement was made by Sena UBT's Sanjay Raut and Congress's Nana Patole at a press conference on Wednesday evening.
"Our final meeting with Pawar Saheb has ended. He told us to tell the media that MVA's seat sharing has ended well. We have finalised it in the 85-85-85 formula. That would take us to 270. Then the rest of the 18 seats will be given to the friends," Sanjay Raut said
Later, when it was pointed out that the 85 formula adds up to 255 and not 270, Sena's Anil Desai improvised: "We have to prepare for filling the form and AB form has to be given, so an agreement has been made on 85-85-85. The rest will be given to small friendly parties after some discussion. Whatever remains will be divided among us".
According to reports, there have been several disagreements about how many seats each party should contest as well.
While the Sena (UBT) pushed for 100 seats each for itself and the Congress, and 88 for Sharad Pawar's party, the Congress, ebullient after its Lok Sabha results in the state, held out for 125 seats.
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