BHUBANESWAR: As the ruling Biju Janata Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party alliance continued to grapple with the seat-sharing arrangement on Tuesday, the Opposition Congress announced its decision to go it alone in the coming panchayat polls.

The Congress said it had finalised the names of its candidates for as many as 27 districts.

The names of the party candidates for the Zilla Parishad seats in the remaining three districts would be finalised soon, a senior leader of the party said.

The Congress had fielded its candidates in 819 of the total 854 Zilla Parishad seats in the last panchayat polls. In the remaining seats, it had reached an understanding with other Opposition parties.

Problem areas

In the case of the ruling alliance, the Coordination Committee of two parties failed to reach a consensus on sharing of seats between them in about a dozen districts.

Chief Minister and BJD president Naveen Patnaik, however, told presspersons that discussion were still on and they were hopeful of reaching agreement on sharing of the Zilla Parishad seats in a majority of districts.

"It is not possible to reach agreement on seat-sharing in at least one-third of the total of 30 districts and there would be friendly contests between nominees of both parties," Mr. Patnaik.

The Coordination Committee of the alliance will meet for the third day on Wednesday to hold further discussions on the issue as it was not able to make office-bearers of district units of the two parties agree on sharing of the seats.

Party insiders said that the process of negotiation for sharing the Zilla Parishad seats may continue till January 15, last day for filing of nomination papers.

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