MUMBAI: After a lot of tug of war over sharing of seats, the Congress and its alliance partner the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) finally finalized the seat-sharing deal for the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra under which the Congress will field candidates in 26 constituencies while the NCP in 22 constituencies.
According to information received at the Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee headquarters in Mumbai, the deal was signed on Monday evening in New Delhi by A.K. Anthony, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) in charge of Maharashtra and Defense Minister on behalf of Congress and by Praful Patel, the Civil Aviation Minister, on behalf of the NCP.
The federal ministers, Abdul Rehman Antulay and Vilas Muttemwar, have been given tickets to contest from Raigad district in the Konkan region and Nagpur, respectively, state Industries Minister Narayan Rane’s son Nilesh and AICC General Secretary Mukul Wasnik will contest the polls from Ratnagiri-Sindhudurg and Ramtek, respectively.
