india

Updated: Nov 06, 2019 11:29 IST

Senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel met Union minister and prominent Maharashtra leader Nitin Gadkari at his home on Wednesday to discuss ‘farmer issues’ as politics over government formation in the state picked pace with November 9 deadline fast approaching.

“I met him over farmer issues. It was not a political meeting or on Maharashtra politics,” Patel told reporters after the meeting.

The tenure of the current assembly ends on November 9 and a government has to be in place by then. While the BJP and Sena fought the elections together and secured 105 seats and 56 seats respectively, they have been having trouble in coming to an agreement about portfolios and about a shared Chief Minister deal.

Patel and Gadkari meeting comes a day after Maharashtra’s incumbent chief minister Devendra Fadnavis rushed to the RSS headquarters to meet Mohan Bhagwat. The RSS chief is believed to have told Fadnavis to take influential Maharashtra leader Gadkari into confidence and involve him for negotiations with the Sena leaders for government formation. Gadkari has a good rapport with Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray and he can use his good offices to convince them for a government that has a “Hindutva” agenda.