News Brief
INDI Alliance meeting in New Delhi.
While two constituent parties of the INDI Alliance -- Trinamool Congress (TMC) and Janata Dal (United) [JD(U)] -- are technically out of the opposition bloc and Samajwadi Party (SP) is flexing muscles, the alliance still has some hope left.
According to Jagran, the Congress is on the verge of finalising the seat-sharing with its ally parties in various states. Here's a list:
1. AAP: While the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) have decided to contest against each other in Punjab, they will be together as INDI Alliance in Delhi with AAP contesting four and Congress contesting three seats.
The Congress has also planned to give AAP one seat in Gujarat and no seat in Goa as the Congress will contest both seats there. Meanwhile, AAP is pressurising Congress to get one seat in Haryana as well.
2. Maharashtra: Congress has a new ally (in terms of Lok Sabha election), Shiv Sena (UBT) in Maharashtra which is not very willing to give many seats to the Congress in the state.
However, the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) is known to have brought all three parties together and the seat-sharing deal is almost final.
The party has reportedly given the list of its desired seats to its ally Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). In the 2019 elections, it contested nine seats with the RJD contesting 19 seats.
4. Jharkhand: With new CM Champai Soren winning the trust vote, the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM)-Congress alliance seems to be enthused and might not face seat-sharing hurdles.
Reportedly, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi met arrested former Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren's wife Kalpana Soren during his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra to move forward the talks.
5. Tamil Nadu: The seat-sharing talks in the state began last week with the Congress sharing a list of 21 preferred seats with its major ally Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK).
As the Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin is well aware of the growing influence of the BJP in the state under Annamalai's leadership, he will try his best to keep the alliance together and finalise seat-sharing soon.