RANCHI: Chief Minister Hemant Soren and his wife, MLA Kalpana Soren, met with Congress National President Mallikarjun Kharge and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, in Delhi on Wednesday to discuss seat-sharing arrangements for the upcoming Assembly elections in Jharkhand. Following this preliminary discussion, Soren is also expected to meet other senior Congress leaders to finalise the seat-sharing formula.Soren is likely to return from Delhi on October 12 on the day of Vijayadashami.Sources within the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) indicated that initial conflicts over certain seats between the two parties have been resolved, and the alliance will contest the elections together. The debacle of the Congress in the Haryana Assembly elections was also part of the discussions, sources said. “Learning from the Haryana results, the INDI Alliance will contest the Jharkhand elections with greater strength to avoid a similar outcome,” said a senior JMM leader. He added that while the Congress is pushing for 33 seats this time, a final decision will be made after further discussions, stressing that the priority is securing victory for the INDI Alliance rather than focusing on individual parties’ seat allocations.Other alliance partners, such as the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) (CPI-ML), are also demanding more seats in this election. Additionally, there are tensions within the alliance, with the Congress reportedly challenging the leadership of Hemant Soren.Recently, the JMM had also threatened the Congress that the party will contest the Assembly polls on all 81 seats if any question is raised on the leadership of Hemant Soren by the coalition partners. JMM’s reply had come in response to the recent statement made by Jharkhand Congress in-charge Ghulam Ahmed Mir that if the Congress party wins 30-40 seats in the Assembly polls, there might be a possibility that both JMM and Congress have Chief Ministers on a rotational basis.JMM General Secretary and Spokesperson Supriyo Bhattacharya cleared that those who agree to contest Jharkhand polls under JMM’s leadership are welcome; otherwise the party is fully prepared to contest all 81 seats in Jharkhand. Negotiations have already started within the ruling INDIA bloc over the seat-sharing formula as JMM is demanding more than 43 seats, the Congress 33 seats and the RJD at least 14 seats.In 2019, the JMM had contested 43 seats, winning 30; the Congress won 16 of the 31 seats contested; and the RJD contested seven seats, winning just one.
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