Mumbai: After the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) offered 96 seats to the Vanchit Bahujan Aaghadi, the VBA has now offered 144 seats to the Congress-NCP alliance. Earlier, the VBA had just offered 40 seats to the Congress Party.
Speaking at press conference on Monday, Prakash Ambedkar, the VBA chief made this offer.
He appealed to the Congress to accept the offer. Last week, the Congress and the NCP offered 96 seats to the VBA for the upcoming Assembly election.
The Maharashtra Congress leadership had given a formula where of the 288 seats in the state Assembly, the three parties will contest 96 seats each. But, the offer by the Congress-NCP alliance had a rider of equal distribution of seats, that is 96, among the three parties.
With the offer of 144 seats to the Congress-NCP alliance, it is clear that the VBA has rejected the 96-seat offer by the Congress-NCP alliance. Now, the VBA has promised 8-hour duty to the police personnel.
“Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar had put efforts to implement the 8-hour duty norms for the police force when he was the labour minister, but no governments thereafter could bring this concept into reality,” Ambedkar said. The VBA also promised permanent government jobs to Home Guard.
“Approximate 36,000 home guard employees in the state help maintain security. Sadly, they earn a paltry Rs2,500 to Rs3,000 per month. I feel sorry for them, who must be finding it difficult to sustain their families,” he added.
