Friday, March 29, 2024
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Pre-poll alliance unlikely

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2018 State Assembly elections

SHILLONG: With the trend of political parties going separately to contest the byelection to seven vacant Council seats, indications are that the same may be the pattern in the 2018 Assembly polls too. All the political parties — Congress, NCP, UDP, HSPDP, KHNAM and BJP — have fielded candidates for the Council by-polls scheduled for December 13. After the Assembly polls in Assam, which saw the BJP-backed North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA) forming the government, there was enthusiasm among the non-Congress political parties to repeat the same coalition in Meghalaya when it goes to polls in 2018.Moreover, many political parties had also stressed the need to have a pre-poll alliance to take on the Congress. However, the emerging situation is that the parties may fight the Assembly polls separately as no one is prepared for seat-sharing ahead of the polls. Though UDP leader Bindo Lanong after the recent meeting of the UDP Shillong city said that he was trying to reach out to the regional parties, there is lukewarm response from the parties. As per the current trend, while the BJP is yet to make clear the number of seats the party will contest, the Congress will put up candidates in all the 60 Assembly constituencies in the State. Earlier, there was an attempt by the state functionaries of BJP to field a candidate for the by-election to Tura seat, but the intervention of the central leadership resulted in the state BJP supporting the candidature of NPP leader Conrad Sangma, who also secured the support of all the non-Congress parties. However, the situation has changed after the Tura by-poll and sources added that the state BJP leaders may insist for putting up candidates for majority of seats in 2018 and in that context, the scope will be limited for the regional parties to go for seat adjustment. A UDP functionary revealed that it appears that the political parties want to contest the Assembly polls separately leaving the option for only post-poll alliances. However, recently former Congress leader RG Lyngdoh said that sacrifice on the part of non-Congress parties is the need of the hour to ensure their victory in the Assembly polls even as he added that the ‘friendly contests’ hoping for a post-poll alliance would be only advantageous to the Congress.

 

 

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