Mumbai: After weeks of haggling over the sharing of seats for the forthcoming Maharashtra assembly elections, the four main political parties are coming round to some kind of agreement that will see them fight the polls with their long-time allies.

With the Shiv Sena and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) declaring at a rare joint press conference on Tuesday that they were keen on keeping the alliance intact, there were unconfirmed reports that the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) were also keen to arrive at some conclusion by the end of the day.

If the Sena and BJP fight together, there is no way that the Congress and NCP can afford to go it alone in the elections, as the ruling coalition of 15 years is already facing an anti-incumbency factor.

BJP’s national leaders, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah, have advised that the state leaders try their best to ensure that the saffron alliance is not broken.

With only four days to go for filing nominations on September 27, Sena leader Sanjay Raut and BJP leader Vinod Tawde, putting up a united front of the two parties, emphasised at the press meet that “various proposals on seat-sharing are being worked out.”

Raut said: “The alliance will remain intact. Both the parties are keen on the alliance,”

Tawde shared Raut’s sentiments.

“Both the parties want to oust the Congress and NCP from power. We feel the alliance should remain intact,” he said, adding that a meeting will be held along with other alliance partners, and a new proposal will be discussed.

“We will take the final decision by the end of the day.”

The two parties have reportedly reached an understanding wherein the Sena will contest 151 seats as it has been insisting all along and the BJP gets a share of 130 seats, more than the initial 119 seats, in the 288-seat assembly. That means their smaller allies will be getting only seven seats and in all likelihood they are not going to be happy about it. Such a decision may not go down well with Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatna’s Raju Shetti, a popular leader among farmers particularly in western Maharashtra region and Ramdas Athawale of the Republican Party of India that represents the Dalit community.

Pankaja Munde, daughter of the late BJP leader and union minister Gopinath Munde, also said: “The BJP has always been in favour of keeping the alliance intact, and we are hopeful of a positive decision. When they [Balasaheb Thackeray and Gopinath Munde] were alive, parties used to respect their decisions, I’m sure the same will happen this time.”

For the Congress and NCP who have been squabbling over the seats with NCP president Sharad Pawar insisting they contest 144 and the Congress refusing to give in, it is possible that they could be agreeing to the Congress 158 and the NCP 130.