A meeting of the Central Election Committee of the Congress Party was held for the Maharashtra and Jharkhand assembly elections in which about 62 seats for Maharashtra were discussed while the names of candidates have been finalized for 18 out of 29 seats held by the Congress in Jharkhand. According to sources, party president Mallikarjun Kharge has been authorized to decide the names for the remaining 11 seats of Jharkhand. The Congress list for Jharkhand is expected to come in a day or two.
There is still a tussle over seats for the Maharashtra Assembly elections between the Congress Party and its allies Shiv Sena (UBT) and Sharad Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party. The 96 seats for which Congress had finalized its names in its screening committee. Only 62 seats have been discussed in the Central Election Committee meeting.
After the meeting, Congress state president Nana Patole and Maharashtra Congress in-charge Ramesh Chennithala have informed that an important meeting of Mahavikas Aghadi will be held in Mumbai on Tuesday at 3 pm and senior Congress leader Balasaheb Thorat will separately speak to Sharad Pawar and Uddhav. By meeting Thackeray, we will resolve the issues stuck in seat distribution.
Only after the meeting to be held in Mumbai, Congress will decide when to release the list of its candidates. However, the state Congress leadership has also said that the next meeting of the Central Election Committee will be held on October 25 and by then all the names will be finalized and the dispute in the alliance will also be resolved.
62 seats of Vidarbha are coming in the way in the seat agreement between Congress and Uddhav Thackeray in Maharashtra's Mahavikas Aghadi. In the last Lok Sabha elections, Congress had won 5 out of 10 seats while Uddhav Sena had won only one seat. Now Uddhav Thackeray is staking his claim on 25-30 seats of Vidarbha in the assembly elections, for which the state leadership of Congress is not at all ready.
