Sena president Uddhav Thackeray declared the party's decision on Tuesday evening after conferring with senior party leaders.
JD (U) leader and Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar expressed happiness that the Bihar Governor would be the NDA's candidate for the President elections. With various issues like procurement prices, the mismanagement of tonnes and tonnes of tur daal rotting in market yards, the crashing prices of vegetables due to continuing after-effects of demonetisation that also led to the failure of various co-operative banks to extend crop loans to farmers etc, Shetti had been seeking an appointment with Fadnavis for months. The BJP has remained non-committal to the names though it has said it is open to discussions.
He further said that the RSS chief had himself rejected the offer while dubbing it as 'good entertainment news'.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, part of the three-meber panel set up by Bharatiya Janata Party chief Amit Shah to evolve a consensus among ruling and opposition parties on the presidential choice, has spoken to leaders of the Trinamool Congress and Biju Janata Dal.
The CPI (M) said the way Kovind's name was announced it portends that there would be a political contest. "We do not support this", he said. "By the time they finalize their candidate the polls would be over". "Despite differences we have to take all parties into confidence".
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The party said the BJP should not try to take political advantage of the situation in Darjeeling owing to political differences with West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee. Kovind would become the second Dalit President of India, after KR Narayanan who served as the President from 1997 to 2002.
Shiv Sena president Uddhav Thackeray said the Sena would not be interested in supporting the BJP nominee if he had been chosen only because he is a Dalit. The party first pitched Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat as its first preference, saying only a person like him can guide the country in the direction of being a Hindu nation, resolve the Ram Temple issue in Ayodhya and help enforce a uniform civil code - all core promises of the BJP.
After the 90-minute meeting, both leaders had reiterated that the Sena-BJP partnership would work to complete its tenure of five years.
The nomination process for the Presidential Election began from June 14 with the issuance of a notification and the last date for filing of nomination is June 28.
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