New Delhi: NCP (Nationalist Congress Party) chief Sharad Pawar and Congress president Sonia Gandhi had a "secret" meeting early last week on seat sharing between the two parties for the October 13 elections but apparently it did not help the tough bargaining still going on between the two parties. Alliance sources said that Pawar met Gandhi at her 10, Janpath residence on September 7 for the yet-undisclosed discussions. The Congress chief is understood to have suggested that the NCP president should not "bother" much about the issue given his stature as a senior leader.

The parleys are expected to shift to Delhi tomorrow (Sep 15, 2004) as Pawar is likely to come to New Delhi from Mumbai.

NCP sources said that the bone of contention now was the seat sharing in Mumbai having 34 Assembly constituencies while the problem has been sorted out as regards Vidarbha.

Two days back Pawar had announced that the seat sharing arrangement would be finalised in a day or two.

Congress appears to be in a dilemma over Pawar's suggestion of inclusion of the Vidarbha Statehood issue in the joint manifesto as leaders from rest of Maharashtra, especially from Mumbai and Konkan, feel that such a development would be suicidal for the party in these regions.

These leaders have cautioned the Congress leadership that separate Vidarbha stand by the party would help Shiv Sena recover the lost ground. Shiv Sena managed only one seat in Mumbai as the Congress swept the megapolis by bagging five seats in the Lok Sabha polls.