Congress, NCP part ways for polls

Mumbai: The Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have parted ways for the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) polls scheduled for early next year. Going ahead with its decision to contest the elections alone, the NCP declared its first list of 45 candidates on Thursday, while the Congress held a meeting of its top leaders for the municipal corporation and zilla parishad polls.

The NCP has given an opportunity to its 14 sitting corporators and a few new faces. Two seats have been given to NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik’s brother Captain Malik and sister, Dr Saida Arif Khan, who is a sitting corporator. NCP Mumbai president Sachin Ahir, who declared the list, said that priority has been given to candidates as per their work. “We have taken interviews and also seen the work done by the candidates before giving tickets. We will soon declare our next list for the BMC polls. We will contest the polls with all our strength,” Mr Ahir said.

On the other hand, Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam declared that the party would be contesting the polls alone. “It has remained our stand that we will be contesting the BMC polls independently. There was no discussion about the alliance,” Mr Nirupam said. The party has started preparations to contest polls for all the 227 wards of the BMC, and responsibilities have been accordingly assigned to the leaders. Sources in the Congress said that since the beginning, both the parties were not keen on going in for an alliance.