With the assembly elections nearing in the state of Maharashtra, the political parties have upped their political games, prepping up for the big battle.

One of the state’s major political parties, the Shiv Sena, has urged the Election Commission of India to hike the poll expenditure budget for each candidate.  The party has asked to raise the limit from Rs 28 lakh to Rs 70 lakh.

Sena leader and Rajya Sabha MP Anil Desai made the representation to the ECI during the meeting of public representatives with Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora, Election Commissioners Ashok Lavasa and Sushil Chandra.

The Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), and also by Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) also supported the demand raised by the Sena.

Desai further informed that the ECI has informed that polls will be held through EVMs and Voter-Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines in a free and fair manner.

The poll panel is in Mumbai to review the preparedness for the elections, due in October.

Meanwhile, in another development, the Uddhav Thackeray-led party is trying to corner the senior ally, BJP, over various issues. The reports came after speculations are rife that Shiv Sena is unhappy with the BJP seeking more seats than the Sena for the upcoming Maharashtra polls.

“The BJP is not willing to give more than 120 seats to the Sena and we don’t approve of it. Before the announcement of alliance in February, Uddhavji and BJP President Amit Shah agreed to contest equal number of seats in the Assembly polls,” a senior Sena leader said.