Lok Sabha elections: Congress, NCP dosti all but over

The NCP’s ‘clock’ is likely to tick without the Congress’s ‘hand’ this Lok Sabha polls as time is running out for an alliance between the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party in Gujarat. Both parties have adopted a combative stance, while adding that there is still a scope of an alliance as the last day for filing nominations is April 4.

"NCP will go ahead and announce its candidates for all 26 seats in the next two or three days," NCP state chief Jayant Patel said on Thursday.
NCP fielding candidates on all seats along with five assembly seats where bypolls are to be held, will translate into a division in the anti-BJP votes. NCP had sought Porbandar, Panchmahal and Gandhinagar seats as part of the seat-sharing formula.
Although the Congress and the NCP have been natural allies at the national level for long, the two parties have not been able to stitch up a sustainable alliance in Gujarat.
Both the parties had a pre-poll alliance in the 2004 and 2014 general elections in Gujarat. The Congress left the Rajkot LS seat for the NCP in 2004 and the Porbandar LS seat in 2014. NCP lost on both occasions. The two parties did not have any pre-poll alliance in Gujarat during the 1999 and 2009 general elections. NCP fielded candidates on seven seats in 1999, all of whom lost, and again on seven seats in 2009. No NCP candidate was able to win in 2009 either.
In the 2017 assembly elections, after alliance talks between Congress and NCP failed at the last minute, NCP fielded 58 candidates, and registered a win on the Kutiyana seat alone. However, the NCP cost the Congress five assembly seats. If an alliance would have happened between the Congress and the NCP, the BJP would have been reduced to 94 seats in the assembly.
In the 2012 assembly polls, the Congress shared 12 seats with the NCP. Only two of its MLAs – Kandhal Jadeja and Jayant Patel — won from Kutiyana and Umreth respectively. Again in 2007, despite an alliance, Congress and NCP fielded candidates against each other in Sayajigunj and Raopura constituencies. In the 2002 assembly elections, the NCP did not have a tie-up with the Congress. It contested 81 seats and adversely impacted the Congress’s prospects on 14 assembly seats.
With just a week to go before the last day for filing nominations and a tie-up between the Congress and NCP not working out, it appears as if the NCP will play spoilsport yet again for the Congress.