After two days of hectic discussions on seat sharing between the Congress and the National Conference leadership for the upcoming assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir, the two parties on Monday sealed an agreement under which the National Conference will contest on 51 seats and Congress on 32.

“We have agreed to have a friendly but disciplined contest on 5 seats. Over and above these 88 seats, we have left one seat for CPI (M) and one seat for Panthers Party,” J&K Congress chief Tariq Hameed Karra told newsmen in Srinagar.

Karra said that tomorrow is the last day for filing nominations for the 24 seats that will go to polls in the first phase on 18 September. We have a stated number of seats also in the other two phases. Polling for 26 seats and 46 seats will be held in the second and third phase.

After a final round of meeting with Congress leaders KC Venugopal and Salman Khurshid, the National Conference president Dr Farooq Abdullah said: “It is a matter of great happiness that both of us will fight together against those forces who are trying to divide people here and the whole country. The INDIA alliance was formed so that we can fight those forces who want to communalize, divide and break the country.”

“Today we have completed the negotiations and have done coordination in a very good and cordial atmosphere. Congress and the National Conference will fight the elections together,” he added.

NC MP from Srinagar Aga Ruhullah Mehdi said: “The major factor was that we don’t want to leave any space for the BJP to exploit. There are many constituencies in Jammu where the National Conference is not very strong, and we feel that in those areas, the Congress can give a good fight to the BJP. If we support Congress in those areas, that fight will convert into victory. That is the most important factor of this alliance. We don’t want a situation where the BJP wins a significant number of seats and repeats what they have done to the state over the last 10 years. We want to bring this to an end.”

It is worth mentioning that seat sharing between the two parties appeared to have hit a roadblock as NC and Congress activists at eight places were not in favour of leaving the seat for the other party.

Venugopal and Khurshid, who were rushed to Srinagar by the Congress high command, reached the residence of Farooq Abdullah this morning to discuss the seat-sharing issue between the two parties. They said the meeting was necessitated after “some differences” cropped up in seat-sharing arrangements during the talks between the local leadership of the parties.