New Delhi: After much deliberation, the INDIA parties have come to a decision to work out their seat-sharing formula by the end of this month for forthcoming state elections and the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. It anticipated to sort out at the state level “at the earliest”.

In its first, the INDIA bloc held a meeting of their 14-member coordination committee here at the residence of NCP chief Sharad Pawar. As per the media soures, the Opposition bloc will come up with a formula by the October-end to come head on against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Omar’s plan may complicate seat sharing Though the INDIA bloc of opposition parties said that the seat-sharing formula would be decided at the state level, there was a discussion that also brought to the fore the complexities involved in the task.

Emerging from the first meeting, National Conference leader Omar Abdullah said, “I have proposed that seats that are already held by members of the INDIA bloc should not be open for discussion. We should be discussing those seats that are held by either BJP or parties not in our alliance.”

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As per the political experts, such a formula would leave those who did not do well in different geographies discontented. The bloc decided to launch “joint public gatherings” across India, “conduct a caste census” and, importantly, draw up a list of media programs and TV presenters that would ostracized by them.

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The Trinamool Congress, whose leader Mamata Banerjee had opposed the inclusion of “caste census” in the alliance’s agenda at its last meeting in Mumbai, was not represented at the meeting.

Asked if the Trinamool would agree to allow ‘caste census’ to be included in the list of common priorities, members of the coordination committee said they would probe the TMC and CPM leadership, another absent person, when asked.

An empty seat was allocated in Wednesday’s meeting to mark the absence of TMC functionary Abhishek Banerjee to register his protest against the BJP’s alleged revenge policy.

Banerjee spoke to Pawar, Congress’s KC Venugopal and other members of the committee, explaining his reasons for not attending the meeting and the issues to be discussed. Venugopal began Wednesday’s joint press conference after the two-and-a-half-hour meeting by saying, “Banerjee could not attend the meeting due to the revenge politics of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”