Maharashtra govt formation: Ashok Chavan says Congress, NCP will take joint decision on course of action if BJP-Shiv Sena stalemate doesn’t end

Mumbai: Congress leader Ashok Chavan on Wednesday said his party and the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) will jointly decide their future course of action if a BJP-Shiv Sena government is not formed in Maharashtra. Talking to reporters, the former Maharashtra chief minister said that the mandate in the 21 October election was for the Congress-NCP combine to sit in the Opposition. No party has got a majority in the Assembly polls and that is why the Congress feels the BJP shouldn’t be in power, Chavan said. [caption id=“attachment_2132427” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Congress leader Ashok Chavan. AFP[/caption] “The state has suffered a lot in the last five years. Farmers are in crisis… the economic situation is not good,” added the newly-elected MLA from Bhokar in the Nanded district. Asked about the possibility of his party supporting a Shiv Sena-led government, the former MPCC president said the Congress and the NCP will jointly decide their future course of action if a BJP-Sena government is not in place in the coming days. The NCP has been repeatedly saying that the Sharad Pawar-led party and the Congress have received mandate to sit in the Opposition. Leader of Opposition in the outgoing Assembly, Vijay Wadettiwar of the Congress claimed 90 percent MLAs of his party feel the BJP shouldn’t form the next government. Meanwhile, Maharashtra Congress president Balasaheb Thorat and other senior leaders held a meeting in the evening and discussed the prevailing political situation in the state. According to sources, some Congress legislators and leaders may visit New Delhi to convince the central leadership about the need to keep the BJP out of power and support the Shiv Sena if such a situation arises. A section in the Maharashtra Congress has favoured backing the Uddhav Thackeray-led party in government formation to keep the BJP out of power in the state. However, the Congress central leadership has not yet warmed up to this idea. Besides, Thorat and Chavan, the meeting was attended by state Congress leaders like Wadettiwar, Vishwajit Kadam, Amit Deshmukh, Nitin Raut, Hussain Dalwai and Yashomati Thakur, among others. In the election, the BJP won 105 seats followed by the Sena 56, the NCP 54 and the Congress 44. In the 288-member House, the majority mark is 145. The BJP and Shiv Sena are locked in a bitter tussle over sharing of the chief minister’s post and ministerial portfolios, delaying installation of a new government even two weeks about the poll results were announced.