While the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance was blinking internally on local body elections in Maharashtra, Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Uddhav Thackeray and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar met on Monday at Pawar's Mumbai residence, Silver Oak. The meeting has drawn considerable attention as Shiv Sena (UBT) has decided to contest the BMC elections on its own.
Discussions revolved around NCP's plan to contest around 50 of the 227 seats in BMC elections. Pawar recently clarified that while MVA and INDIA alliances were formed regarding the Lok Sabha and state assembly elections, no specific agreements exist regarding local elections. He ensured that discussions between the three parties would soon happen to agree on a common ground for the coming local elections.
Those present at the meeting included Aaditya Thackeray, Sanjay Raut, and Jayant Patil. They discussed the hearing before the Supreme Court coming on January 22 on local body elections and took stock of the recent state cabinet resolution empowering the Chief Minister to appoint the State Election Commissioner.
This meeting highlights the shifting scenarios within the MVA alliance as they ponder upon strategies towards conducting local body elections.