The Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have finalised the seat-sharing for the Maharashtra state Assembly polls. However, declarations of the candidates are postponed due to pitrupaksha and possible poaching of incumbent party candidates.

NCP chief Sharad Pawar has declared that the Congress and the NCP will contest the 125 each candidate while remaining 38 seats by the allies. "We have also finalised the 50 candidates list but decided not to declare it now. The pitrupaksha is going on it is not considered an auspicious moment to do the good work as per the Hindu religion. Therefore, the finalised candidate names will be declared once the pitrupaksha gets over. Besides, there are many sitting MLAs and potential ruling party candidates are in our touch, therefore, we are waiting for the Sena and BJP to announce its seat-sharing and names of candidates," said senior Congress leader requested anonymity.

NCP spokesperson Nawab Malik said the seat-sharing talk with the Congress is almost over. "We are now discussing with the smaller allies about their seat-sharing. We have given them 38 seats and out of these seats, they have to choose and identify the candidates. We do not want to see the splitting the secular and anti-government votes. All the names of the candidates will be declared at the appropriate time," Malik said.

Senior Congress leader said that last week they had a meeting with the Congress president Sonia Gandhi where the majority of the candidate names were finalised.