Agartala, September 10:
The BJP and its ruling alliance partner TIPRA Motha on Thursday held a second round of discussions to sort out their seat-sharing arrangement for the Tripura Village Committee elections but stopped short of disclosing a final formula, saying around 80 per cent of the issues had been resolved and the remaining matters would be settled through consultations by Thursday night.
The discussions, chaired by Parliamentary Affairs Minister and senior BJP leader Ratan Lal Nath, centred mainly on nominations filed by both parties in excess of the seats agreed upon under their alliance arrangement.
The leaders said the seat-sharing was being worked out on the basis of the results of the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC) elections. However, neither side gave details of the number of seats finally allocated to the BJP and TIPRA Motha after Thursday’s second round of talks.
Nath said the parties were continuing discussions and questioned the inability of the CPI(M) and Congress to field candidates in several constituencies where independents had submitted nominations.
“If independents can give candidates, why could CPI(M) and Congress not give candidates?” Nath said, asserting that the opposition parties lacked public support in the tribal areas.
TIPRA Motha leader and Minister of State Brisaketu Debbarma said about 80 to 90 per cent of the issues had been settled during the meeting, while the remaining matters would be resolved through telephone discussions with local leaders.
He said the basic seat-sharing arrangement remained unchanged and the talks were intended to address cases where additional candidates had filed nominations.
Motha MLA Ranjit Debbarma also said candidates who had filed additional nominations in seats allocated to another alliance partner would withdraw their papers by Friday, the last date for withdrawal.
He said reports regarding such cases had been received from different blocks and the issues were being resolved in consultation with local leaders.
The absence of another NDA constituent, the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT), from Thursday’s meeting was significant. The party had earlier raised questions over the law-and-order situation following an alleged attack on its general secretary Swapan Debbarma, in which he was injured. The IPFT was also not represented in the latest round of seat-sharing discussions.
The Village Committee polls are being held for 4,597 seats in 587 Village Committees. A total of 10,938 candidates have filed 10,961 nomination papers, according to the figures provided after the nomination process.
After scrutiny of nomination papers valid nominations of TIPRA Motha are 4,361 nominations, followed by the CPI(M) with 2,456, BJP 1,974, IPFT 486 and Congress 466. The CPI has four nominations, while independents, minor parties and other unrecognised political parties account for 1,149 nominations making 10,889 candidates in the Village Committee fray.
There were single nominations for 1,169 seats, while three seats received no nominations. The final electoral picture will emerge after withdrawal of nominations on September 11.
The BJP and TIPRA Motha leaders expressed confidence that the remaining differences would be resolved before the withdrawal deadline. However, the absence of a publicly announced final seat-sharing formula after two rounds of talks leaves the exact contours of the alliance’s electoral arrangement to be clarified on Friday.
