Sonia Gandhi and Sharad Pawar Likely to Discuss Alliance With Shiv Sena on November 17

Congress president Sonia Gandhi and NCP chief Sharad Pawar are expected to hold talks in Delhi on November 17 about a possible tie-up with the Shiv Sena to form a government in Maharashtra, sources said on Thursday.

Common minimum programme

According to the sources, the Congress and the NCP would work with the Sena on a common minimum programme (CMP), to be taken up later by Gandhi and Pawar. It was not clear if or when Sena president Uddhav Thackeray would meet the two leaders after the CMP was ready.

A 10-member Congress-NCP coordination committee held initial talks on the CMP in Mumbai on Wednesday. As agreed there, Thackeray was met on Thursday morning by Balasaheb Thorat and Jayant Patil, who head the Congress and the NCP in the state. The sources said leaders of the three parties would meet again that day to prepare the draft, which would then go to each party’s top leadership for approval.

How the deadlock arose

The BJP and the Shiv Sena fought the October 21 assembly election together and won 105 and 56 seats respectively, a comfortable majority in the 288-member House. They split after the Sena insisted on rotating the chief minister’s post, and the BJP then said it was not in a position to stake a claim. After the Sena and the NCP, the second and third largest parties, also said they could not stake an immediate claim, President’s rule was imposed in the state on Tuesday.

What happened next

Uddhav Thackeray of the Shiv Sena became Chief Minister in November 2019 with the support of the NCP and the Congress.

See also: Nationalist Congress Party and Indian National Congress.

Originally published on 15 November 2019. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.

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