Congress holds discussions to decide candidates for 174 Maharashtra seats

NEW DELHI: Congress today deliberated on selection of candidates for 174 seats in Maharashtra, which it had contested in the last assembly polls, with no seat arrangement still decided with Sharad Pawar's NCP for the October 15 vote.

State Congress chief Manikrao Thakre said that it was for the high command to decide on the issue of seat sharing with NCP.

In the last Assembly elections, Congress had contested 174 seats while the NCP had fought in 114 seats in the 288 member Maharashtra Assembly.

This time, the NCP is pitching for as many as 144 seats contending that the two parties should share 50:50 share in the wake of in the results in the Lok Sabha polls.

In the Lok Sabha polls, the Congress could secure only two seats while NCP had won four out of total 48 Lok Sabha seats in the state.

Thakre evaded questions on whether Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan will be contesting the polls and, if yes, from which constituency.

Chavan had been saying that he will be contesting from Karad South seat in his home district of Satara.

Currently, he is a member of the state legislative council.

The development came as the process of filing nominations for the October 15 election to the state Assembly began today with authorities issuing the poll notification.

Maharashtra's over 8.28 crore voters are eligible to exercise their franchise in the single-phase election for its 13th assembly.

September 27 is the deadline for filing nomination. After scrutiny of papers, the last date for withdrawal of nominations is October 1. Counting of votes will take place on October 19. The existing assembly's term expires on November 8.