New Delhi: There seems to be no end to the seat sharing tussle between Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). BJP's Parliamentary Board met late on Sunday for a brainstorming session on the way forward in the Maharashtra polls.
According to sources, the BJP is ready to fight the Maharashtra polls alone but they want to wait to salvage the alliance with Shiv Sena. In a last ditch effort, Shiv Sena offered 119 seats to BJP and 18 to other allies keeping 151 for itself out of 288. The BJP is unhappy with the proposal as the contested on 119 seats in 2009 Assembly elections too.
Hoping for a fresh round of talks with the Sena leadership, BJP Maharashtra leaders are expected to go to Mumbai on Monday morning. Both in Delhi and Mumbai, BJP and Sena shortlisted candidates for the polls but refrained from announcing the list.
"It was decided that efforts should be made to ensure that there is a respectable and mature understanding on seat- sharing and the alliance is kept intact. BJP wants to go to the polls along with Sena and other alliance partners," BJP incharge for Maharashtra Rajiv Pratap Rudy said after the marathon meeting of the party's Central Election Committee (CEC).
The CEC is understood to have shortlisted 120 candidates out of a list of over 180 candidates that were discussed. This was followed by an informal meeting of the BJP Parliamentary Board to discuss the strategy in the wake of Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray pegging seats for BJP at 119.
Both the meetings, which went on for over three hours, were attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP President Amit Shah, who spent some time together separately, and other leaders.
Shah is believed to have spoken to Thackeray in the midst of the BJP meets, but there was no official word on it. Some BJP leaders made it clear that the party was ready to fight the polls on its own if Sena is unrelenting. BJP said there was "nothing new" in Sena's final offer and hoped seat-sharing issue can be mutually settled.
Though there is pressure from the cadres from the state to go it alone in the polls, the BJP said that it wants to continue with the alliance.
The BJP also reminded Sena that while the former has always sacrificed for the latter, the party has never returned the favour. "BJP-Shiv Sena alliance is very old. Seat sharing needs to be such that Congress is defeated. Such issues need to be discussed face to face," BJP leader Vinod Tawde said.
"We can give BJP 119 seats to the BJP and 18 to other smaller parties. BJP's OP Mathur was trying to negotiate on seats. I reminded them they are not givers but takers on this land. We are making a last attempt to save the alliance. Regardless of whether alliance stays or not, we will fight everywhere. Victory will be ours," Thackeray had said.
As a reminder to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Uddhav said that it was Sena's Bal Thackeray who backed him after the Godhra riots.
Making an emotional pitch, Thackeray said, "The BJP-Sena alliance is not about seats. It is about the Hindutva ideology. BJP and Sena have been united over that ideology. There was a time when people wanted to remove Narendra Modi. LK Advani had consulted Balasaheb. It was Balasaheb who said that if you remove Modi, Gujarat will be finished."
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