As pressure mounts from the alliance of the INDIA bloc to finalise seat-sharing for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections at the earliest, the Congress party on Thursday signalled that it may restrict itself to contesting 255 Lok Sabha seats in order to make room for its alliance partners from the Opposition.

At a meeting held on Thursday, the Congress leadership told state units that the seat-sharing talks would begin immediately and that the party would focus on 255 Lok Sabha seats in the upcoming general elections scheduled to be held in April-May this year. The party had contested 421 seats in the 2019 polls and won 52.

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The announcement by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge came during a meeting attended by AICC general secretaries, state Congress unit presidents, and CLP leaders. Party MP Rahul Gandhi was present in the meeting. The development came at a time of mounting pressure and jostling within the INDIA bloc where regional heavyweights are firm on getting the lion’s share.

West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Punjab and Maharashtra are states where the Congress may have to contend with lesser number of seats. The Trinamool Congress has already made it evident that it was unwilling to cede any space to the Congress in the state.

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“INDIA alliance will be present in entire India and in Bengal the Trinamool Congress will fight. In Bengal, it is only the Trinamool Congress that can teach the BJP a lesson. It can show the entire country the path to victory, not any other party,” West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said recently. The remarks set off a bitter war of words with Congress MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury who said his party was not at the mercy of the TMC and accused Mamata of scuttling Opposition unity.

Elsewhere in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena (UBT) has also flexed its muscle and advised Congress to begin negotiations from zero seats, the party’s Lok Sabha tally from Maharashtra. “This is Maharashtra, and Shiv Sena is the biggest party here. Congress is a national party… We have always said that Shiv Sena has always been fighting on 23 seats in the Lok Sabha elections including Dadra and Nagar Haveli and that will be firm,” senior party leader Sanjay Raut said. Maharashtra has 48 Lok Sabha seats, of which the Congress currently holds none.

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The Aam Aadmi Party, which has also expressed unwillingness to provide too much room to the Congress in Delhi and Punjab, is set to play hardball again. While the national leadership has expressed willingness to discuss seat-sharing, state units on either side have expressed apprehensions over any alliance.

According to The Indian Express, the Congress has decided to hold talks with INDIA parties on a state-to-state basis, implying that talks would be held with the AAP, on seat sharing in Delhi and Punjab separately, as also states like Gujarat and Haryana where the Arvind Kejrwial-led party claims to have some influence.

The decision was taken at Thursday’s meeting when Kharge, Gandhi and general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal met the five-member national alliance committee which submitted its report to the leadership and received the go-ahead to initiate talks with INDIA bloc constituents.