Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray earlier said that he had "promised" his late father Bal Thackeray to install a 'Shiv Sainik' (party worker) as chief minister of Maharashtra. (Photo: PTI)
On the heels of the Bharatiya Janata Party announcing its first list of candidates, the Shiv Sena has also released its list of 124 seats that it will be contesting the 2019 Maharashtra assembly elections.
While the BJP had announced the name of candidates for 125 seats, the Shiv Sena merely released a list of the constituencies it will be contesting without mentioning candidate names.
Though the Shiv Sena has issued 'AB' form (which mentions the official party candidate) to its sitting MLAs as well as to some candidates, no major leader has submitted a nomination so far.
The Shiv Sena list was essentially meant to indicate the numeric division of seats between the BJP and the Sena. On Monday, the two saffron parties had announced that they would be contesting the Maharashtra elections but had not announced the quantum of seats.
With Tuesday's announcement, the division of the NDA alliance in the 288-seat Maharashtra assembly elections will be 125 seats for BJP, 124 seats for Shiv Sena and the remaining 39 seats for smaller partners like Republican Party of India. Along with the 124 seats, the Shiv Sena will also get two MLC seats from the BJP quota.
The initial reports suggested that the Sena and the BJP would fight an equal number of seats for the 288-member House and leave a fraction for smaller allies, the seat-sharing talks remained uneasy with no agreement on the formula for long.
The BJP wanted a bigger share, on the back of its spectacular performance in the April-May Lok Sabha polls but the Sena was not willing to play ball, said sources from both parties.
A key candidate from the Shiv Sena camp will be chief Uddhav Thackeray's son Aaditya Thackeray. Aaditya Thackeray will become the first Thackeray to contest an election. He said on Monday that he will contest the Worli assembly segment in Mumbai.
In the 2014 Assembly elections, the BJP and the Sena had contested separately over a dispute over sharing of seats. The BJP won maximum 122 out of 260 seats it had contested while the Sena bagged 63 out of 282 seats.
After the BJP formed the government in October 2014, the Sena joined it in December the same year.
Maharashtra will go to polls on October 21 and the results will be declared on October 24.
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