Congress MP Praniti Shinde Says MVA Stable, Unlike Chaotic Mahayuti

For the November 20 Maharashtra polls, Congress plans a micro-management strategy with MVA Coordination Committees, war rooms, and observers across all 288 Assembly seats.

New Delhi: The Congress has adopted a micro-management strategy for the November 20 Maharashtra polls and will set up Maha Vikas Aghadi Coordination Committees, war rooms and observers on all 288 Assembly seats. The local war rooms will be manned by the functionaries of the alliance partners Congress, Shiv Sena UBT and NCP-SP and coordinate with the AICC central war room, along with similar setups of the allies.

The alliance leaders said the coordination of the local teams belonging to the three parties had been tested during the Lok Sabha elections a few months ago and will be repeated in the assembly polls as well.

“The MVA is stable as compared to the chaotic Mahayuti. We had very good coordination between the alliance workers during the Lok Sabha elections and will carry it out during the upcoming assembly elections as well. There are local coordination teams and war rooms in all the 288 seats. We special observers for every seat and district besides the AICC observers for the five zones across the state. A team of senior leaders would monitor the polls from Delhi,” Congress Solapur Lok Sabha MP Praniti Shinde told ETV Bharat.

“The edge that MVA had over the Mahayuti in the Lok Sabha polls resulted from coordination and joint strategies. The MVA had some seat-sharing issues, but they were resolved amicably between the alliance partners. The MVA is fighting the BJP on all the seats and will defeat it,” she said.

Out of the total 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra, the MVA won 30, including 14 of Congress, which emerged as the single largest party against 17 of NDA, down from 41 in 2019. Though the national election results had shown the vote share of the NDA at 43.5 per cent was very close to MVA’s 44.9 per cent, in terms of the Assembly polls the MVA had an edge on 157 seats against NDA’s 128 seats.

The MVA unity Shinde said would be displayed on November 6 during the MVA rally in Mumbai and over the coming days as the joint campaign would roll across the state.

Before that, MVA coordination showed in Kolhapur where Congress Lok Sabha MP Chhatrapati Shahu Maharaj welcomed Shiv Sena UBT Uddhav Thackeray, who launched his poll campaign from the area. Later, addressing a rally, the former chief minister expressed confidence that grand old party leader Satej Patil would win all the six assembly seats for the opposition alliance.

In a leg up for the MVA, Kolhapur BJP leader Rahul Desai joined the Congress on November 5 in the presence of Satej Patil and Shahu Maharaj. The Congress managers were also upbeat over the Election Commission listening to their request and ordering for removal of state DGP Rashmi Shukla on November 4.

“The Maharashtra elections are about protecting the local culture. We will unveil our poll promises on Nov 6,” Patole, who campaigned in the Bhandara area, told ETV Bharat.