Coordination committee meeting: INDIA parties leave seat-sharing discussion for state leaders

After the conclusion of the first meeting of the coordination committee held at the residence of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar, leaders of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) have decided to sort out the seat sharing issues at the state level.

Wednesday's meeting was attended by Congress leader K.C. Venugopal, RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, JD-U’s Sanjay Jha, in place of Lallan Singh, CPI’s D. Raja, DMK’s T.R. Baalu, PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti, Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Sanjay Raut, Samajwadi Party’s Javed Ali, AAP’s Raghav Chadha, JMMs Hemant Soren and NC’s Omar Abdullah.

An informed source said that detailed discussions were held on several issues, during which the seat sharing matter also came up.

He said the alliance members decided that the seat sharing issue will be taken care by the leaders at the state level, which needs to be completed by October end.

The matter can then be brought up at the national level to give it it a final shape, the source added.

The source, however, also pointed out that the talks on the issue would require a very complex process in several states, where the seats are already held by the INDIA bloc parties and the parties will not be ready to vacate those seats.

He further said that the process of seat sharing will take time to complete and we are hopeful that it will be done ambicly.

Besides seat sharing, the committee also discussed the skyrocketing prices, unemployment and corruption of the BJP.

Meanwhile, some of the participants also highlighted DMK leader Udhaynidhi Stalin's remark on Sanatana Dharma and asked the party to refrain from making such comments. 

They further pointed out that the issue has snowballed in several states where the BJP is using it to target the INDIA parties.

Other topics of discussion included joint public meetings across the countrym, while the bloc leaders also agreed upon caste census.

At the third meeting of the alliance on August 31 and September 1 in Mumbai, Trinamool Congress supremo and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had objected to the caste census.

At that meeting, the bloc had formed the 14-member coordination committee.

The CPI-M is yet to name a party leader for the committee.