Preliminary alliance talks with NCP complete, says Ashok Chavan

Maharashtra Congress president Ashok Chavan. Express photo by Prashant Nadkar

Maharashtra Congress president Ashok Chavan on Thursday said the party has completed the preliminary talks for a pre-poll alliance with the NCP for the coming Lok Sabha and state Assembly elections. He was talking to reporters at Nanded where the state Congress today held a meeting of party workers from the Marathwada region. “Preliminary talks with the NCP have been completed,” he said.

“We will also take along like-minded parties such as the Bharipa Bahujan Mahasangh, Samajwadi Party, Republican Party of India,” the former chief minister said. The Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party and Congress were in power in Maharashtra for 15 years. The alliance broke up before the 2014 Assembly elections.

To a question, Chavan described the BJP-led Maharashtra government’s claim that rural areas of the state are now open defecation-free as “laughable”. “Even today, 40 to 45 thousand families could be without access to toilets in every district,” the Congress leader claimed.