The ruling alliance in Maharashtra has almost completed the knotty exercise of seat sharing, various leaders indicated off the record today. Sources in the BJP said the party will contest on 158 of the state’s 288 seats. It has offered 70 seats to Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena and 50 to Ajit Pawar’s Nationalist Congress Party.The alliance has also decided not to project a face for the Chief Minister post and Eknath Shinde is expected to remain its face in the run-up to the election, sources said after the Congress and the BJP held parallel strategy meets.
The BJP’s Maharashtra core group meet in Delhi was attended by Union Home Minister Amit Shah and party chief J P Nadda.
Maharashtra BJP president Chandrashekhar Bawankule, Deputy Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and the party’s national general secretary Vinod Tawde were among those present.
The blueprint settles the challenges the Mahayuti was facing – the high demands from alliance partners and the BJP’s internal resistance to allotting seats to Ajit Pawar’s faction of the NCP. The Shiv Sena was asking for 90 seats and the NCP 70.