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New Delhi, October 18 (IANS) Congress MP Tariq Anwar on Saturday criticized the confusion over seat sharing in the Grand Alliance ahead of the Bihar Assembly elections, saying talks of “friendly fight” between the alliance partners on many seats create a wrong perception among the public.
He said the confusion should have been cleared by now, especially since the nomination process for the first phase has already ended.
Despite nominations for the first phase of Bihar assembly elections ending on Friday, no official announcement has been made on seat sharing among the grand alliance partners.
Congress is the only party so far to release its first list of 48 candidates, which it announced on Thursday night.
While other alliance partners including Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP) have not yet declared their lists, several leaders, including RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, have already filed nominations.
The alliance partners continued to distribute tickets till the last day of nominations for the first phase, resulting in both Congress and RJD fielding candidates against each other in at least seven constituencies. Alliance leaders have downplayed it, calling it a “friendly fight”.
Speaking to IANS, Anwar said, “I think there is some communication gap and there is still time for a comeback. Till then efforts will be made to bring everyone together. Some of these incidents have happened due to factionalism, but we have always fought elections together and we are hopeful that these issues will be resolved.”
Expressing disagreement with the idea of a “friendly contest”, the Congress MP said, “In my view, there is no scope for a ‘friendly’ contest. Then what is the point of an alliance? If there is an alliance, it should mean an alliance; otherwise, the parties should contest separately. So while we can have a friendly fight on eight seats and remain united on others, this creates a misconception among the public and sends a wrong message.”
He also pointed out that the delay in finalizing the seat-sharing arrangement reflected poor coordination within the alliance.
He said, “Everyone knew that elections were going to be held and there were two alliances. Discussions should have been held accordingly. The seats should have been decided by now and there should not have been any confusion in any of the alliances.”
–IANS
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