A day after the Congress and Samajwadi Party announced a formal seat-sharing deal for Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh, there are indications that Congress could tie up loose ends in other States, including West Bengal.
A breakthrough in West Bengal could be a huge morale booster for the Opposition bloc that has been smarting from Janata Dal (United) president and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s switch to the BJP-led NDA last month and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee’s ambivalence.
In a positive sign, the Congress-Trinamool talks that had completely broken down, have revived over the last one week. However, according to sources, the Trinamool has set a difficult threshold for the Congress to scale. The party continues to insist that it will only concede two seats to the Congress in West Bengal, and in return it wants one seat each in Meghalaya and Assam.
“In the 2019 general election, in the Tura Lok Sabha seat in Meghalaya, the Trinamool got 28% of the votes and the Congress 9%. Therefore we are rightfully asking the Congress to concede the seat to us, while we will work with them in Shillong, where they got 15% votes and we got 6%,” a senior TMC leader, who is part of the negotiations, said.
In Assam, the Trinamool has demanded two seats, but has conveyed that it will settle for one. “There is no ambiguity in our stand. We give two seats to Congress in Bengal and need two seats in return,” the leader added. The talks failed earlier broadly because of the persistent attack by Congress State president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury on Trinamool leadership and the Congress’ refusal to settle for two seats.
Sources indicated that the seat-sharing pact with the Aam Admi Party (AAP) for Delhi, Haryana and Gujarat is in its final stages. The two parties, however, have already announced that they would be fighting the 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab separately.
In Delhi, the two parties are said to have agreed to share the seven Lok Sabha seats between them. While the AAP is likely to contest the South Delhi, West Delhi, North West Delhi and New Delhi seats, the Congress will be fielding candidates from the Chandni Chowk, East Delhi and North East Delhi constituencies.
The Congress is also likely to give one seat to AAP in Haryana and two in Gujarat. In Gujarat, apart from Bhavnagar, AAP wants to contest the Bharuch seat but former Congress leader Ahmed Patel’s daughter is also a contender.
In Bihar, too, the seat division between the INDIA bloc allies is expected any time soon, said sources. The RJD, being the senior partner, is expected to keep 30 seats for itself, dividing the remaining ten seats between the Congress and the Left parties.
