The Left Front and Congress on Tuesday claimed that they had worked out a seat-sharing mechanism in 230 of Bengal’s 294 assembly seats in the upcoming polls.  Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury formally announced the Congress-Left alliance for the upcoming 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections on Tuesday. Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Chowdhury said that both parties have finalised seat-sharing along with formulating how different ideologies can team up for ‘nation-building’.

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Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said that the seat-sharing formula will be declared once other secular parties, including the RJD, formally join the Congress-Left alliance ahead of the West Bengal Assembly elections.

The Congress leader was referring to Furfura Sharif cleric Abbas Siddiqui’s newly-formed Indian Secular Front (ISF).

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The parties, however, kept their plans in the remaining 64 seats close to their chest, mainly because they needed more time to fine-tune arrangements with Furfura Sharif cleric Abbas Siddiqui’s newly launched Indian Secular Front which has sought 50 seats, and with RJD and NCP with whom the Left has had similar arrangements in the past. “A lot of secular parties including Abbas Siddique’s Indian Secular Front have shown interest in joining the Left-Congress alliance. We have decided not to make our seat-sharing public as we wait for all of the secular parties to join in,” Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said.

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According to sources close to the development, both parties needed some more time to work out the details with ISF, whose president, Nausad Siddiqui, had written to them asking for seats in South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Nadia and and East Midnapore. At nearly all of these places, Left parties have had a greater vote share than Congress. Sources indicated that the Left would have to sacrifice some seats to ISF if the deal has to materialize.

At a press conference held in Kolkata, ISF leader, Abbas Siddique stated that AIMIM leader Owaisi would understand the political necessity of ISF to align with the Left- Congress alliance and that all parties except for BJP and TMC are allowed to form alliance with ISF.