Ambedkar flays Congress, Sena (UBT) failure to strike deal on seats

Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi chief Prakash Ambedkar has highlighted the turmoil within the Maha Vikas Aghadi over seat sharing

Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) chief Prakash Ambedkar has highlighted the turmoil within the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) over seat sharing. Mr. Ambedkar has thus far resisted casting his lot with the opposition coalition. He has now written to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge seeking direct talks for seat-sharing, while detailing problems bedeviling the core MVA parties.

He said the VBA “was not the reason for the deadlock over seat-sharing talks within the MVA.” Mr. Ambedkar, an ally of Uddhav Thackeray’s Sena (UBT) claimed that the Congress and Mr. Thackeray’s faction were at loggerheads over 10 Lok Sabha seats, while there was a lack of concurrence between the Congress, the Sena (UBT) and the Nationalist Congress Party (Sharad Pawar faction) over five seats.

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“The Sena (UBT) and the Congress are not willing to give up any of these seats. This is just one part of the problem. There are five more seats on which Mr. Thackeray’s party, the Congress and the NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) are not willing to compromise,” Mr. Ambedkar said on Tuesday, while speaking to reporters.

The VBA president was particularly severe on Sena (UBT) spokesperson Sanjay Raut, alleging that the latter had “falsely” told the media that the VBA had not sought any seats from the MVA coalition.

“We [the VBA] cannot provide our proposal until their [core MVA parties] fight is resolved We need to know whether they will continue as MVA or have a friendly fight,” said Mr. Ambedkar.

He said while his party wanted to go with the MVA, it could not do so until the three MVA partners had resolved their respective seat-sharing problems.