PANJIM: The Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Wednesday commenced talks on a possible pre-poll alliance for the ensuing Goa Assembly elections.
Goa Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president Girish Chodankar and NCP State president Jose Philip D’Souza met at a hotel at Verna, where they discussed modalities for a pre-poll alliance and the constituencies both parties should contest.
When contacted, Chodankar said they had held preliminary talks and that these will continue. “We met and held preliminary talks. We will meet again,” he said, while refusing to divulge more details.
D’Souza on the other hand admitted that he had talks with Chodankar following the recent meeting between the Congress and the NCP high commands in Delhi. He said that NCP supremo Sharad Pawar and Praful Patel had talks with the Congress leaders P Chidambaram and Dinesh Rao in Delhi and the same was conveyed to him.
Asked how many seats NCP would contest if there is a tie-up between the two parties, D’Souza said that the NCP had asked for eight seats and that negotiations will continue. To another question whether the NCP is ready to compromise on seats, he said that their main aim is to avoid a division of non-BJP votes and to ensure victory of the Congress-NCP alliance.
In the 2017 Assembly poll, the two parties had fought independently after the alliance talks had failed. The Congress secured 17 seats while, NCP could win only one seat in the 40-member Assembly.
Meanwhile, former Union Minister and Congress senior election observer P Chidambaram is arriving in Goa on Friday. During his visit, he will tour five Assembly constituencies and interact with the block Congress committees.
On Friday, Chidambaram will interact the Calangute block Congress committee while, on Saturday, he will meet the block committee members of Dabolim and Nuvem. On sunday, he will interact with the Ponda and Bicholim block Congress committees.