Ajit Pawar, Raj Thackeray discuss pact

Mumbai: Nationalist Congress Party leader Ajit Pawar on Wednesday visited Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray at Dadar to discuss the prospects of an alliance between the two parties, a move considered significant in this poll season. The hush hush meeting took place at a friend’s home and the two leaders have said to have spoken for one and a half hours.

The meeting is considered significant as the MNS and NCP have been engaged in back-channel negotiations for a possible seat sharing/alliance arrangement for the coming Lok Sabha polls. The NCP-MNS meeting comes after Sharad Pawar’s nephew expressed the view that the Congress-NCP alliance would benefit if ‘secular’ parties such as the MNS join the alliance.

Sources from both parties indicated that talks have been going on since last year, but the two couldn’t agree on a seat-sharing formula. The MNS wants at least three Lok Sabha seats — one in Mumbai, one in Nashik and the other in Kalyan — but the NCP is willing to offer only one from its kitty. The Pawar-Thackeray meeting is to find a middle ground, said sources.


The NCP believes that the MNS, with its Marathi vote bank and the oratory skills of Thackeray, would come in handy to not only take on the Shiv Sena but even the BJP as well. Thackeray enjoys several pockets of influence in Mumbai, Thane, Pune and Nashik and Kalyan.

While Congress leaders, especially those like Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam, have opposed the idea of MNS joining a Congress-NCP alliance due to the MNS’ stand on the issue of North Indian migrants taking up jobs in Mumbai. However, other Congress leaders indicated that they had no issues if the NCP was forming its own alliance with the MNS without involving the Congress and giving the MNS chief Lok Sabha ticket from NCP’s own tally.

Interestingly, NCP chief Sharad Pawar had publicly refuted the the possibility of MNS joining the Congress NCP alliance only a few days back.