Saffron sharing: Shiv Sena gets 155, BJP bags 72 seats

After a day-long talks, the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday finalised the seat-sharing for the next-month civic polls.

The  Shiv Sena will contest 155 seats while the BJP will contest 72. The list of candidates will be jointly declared by the alliance partners on January 12.

The joint election manifesto will be announced after January 15. In the final analysis, the BJP managed to get extra three seats:  Bhandup (seat number 104); Juhu (64) and Chikoowadi in Borivali (16). According to alliance sources, the BJP could not accommodate leaders Parag Alwani and ex-deputy mayor Rajesh Sharma in the seat-sharing exercise. Party sources, however, said late in the night, that Alwani may be given a seat somewhere else.

The seat-sharing was announced by senior BJP leader Gopinath Munde at his Purna residence in Worli. The BJP leader said the Sena-BJP shall contest the ensuing BMC elections as an alliance. He added the seat-sharing for the other nine municipal corporations would also be announced in a day or two.

Sena working president Uddhav Thackeray said the seat-sharing exercise was done in a friendly way and expressed hope that the alliance would come out victorious in the civic polls.