Mumbai: Congress youth leaders urge seniors to get in talks with NCP, Uddhav to negotiate seat sharing for LS Polls

The youth leaders of the Congress party have urged their seniors to gear up for the 2024 Lok Sabha (LS) polls and start seat-sharing talks with the NCP and Uddhav Thackeray’s Sena. These young leaders, including four former ministers and three MLAs, have swung into action following the news about primary talks of seat-sharing between the two other Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance partners.

Young Congress leaders reach Delhi

Besides talking to the state leadership last week, the younger Congress lot has also got in touch with the party high-command in Delhi. They feel that the ground situation in Maharashtra is in the MVA’s favour and the poll bugle should be sounded early.

After Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, at 48, has the highest number of LS seats. Earlier, when the Congress and NCP used to contest in alliance, they had a 26-22 or 27-21 seat-sharing formula. But after Uddhav Thackeray’s entry, the situation changed, given that his party won 18 seats in 2019 polls in alliance with the BJP. However, Thackeray is left with only four MPs after the Sena split. However, he will try to contest on maximum seats with the obvious sympathy factor in his favour.

Youngsters ready to engage immediately

“We got to know that the NCP and Uddhav Sena have held two rounds of talks. If we don’t engage them now, we will need hard negotiations. We have told our senior leaders like Ashok Chavan and Balasaheb Thorat as well as state chief Nana Patole. Hope they will act soon,” said a former minister and young leader of Congress.

Another leader said, “We won graduate as well as teachers constituencies in Vidarbha. We even bagged the Kasba Peth seat in Pune. All these three seats were the BJP bastions. It means people are ready to vote for us. We just need to go as a disciplined force before them,” he said.