As it found itself in a spot of bother over its smaller constituent Samajwadi Party’s clamour for 12 seats, Opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) is expecting Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi and SP chief Akhilesh Yadav to intervene and resolve the crisis impeding the seat-sharing arrangement for the State Assembly polls.

Amid the MVA’s efforts to formalise the seat tie-up among its constituents –Congress, Shiv Sena (UBT), NCP (Sharad Pawar) and smaller parties, SP’s Maharashtra unit President Abu Asim Azmi is proving to be a hard nut to crack. For, he has threatened that his party would go it alone if it is not allotted 12 seats.

Currently, the SP has two MLAs – Azmi himself from Mankhurd-Shivajinagar and Rain Shaikh from Bhiwandi (East).

However, the SP has staked a claim for 12 seats, including Mankhurd Shivajinagar, Bhiwandi East, Bhiwandi West, Malegaon, Dhule, Anushaktinagar, Aurangabad East, Byculla and Versova.

Not to be outdone, Azmi has said that if any constituent of the MVA, be it Congress, Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP) or Uddhav Thackeray-headed Shiv Sena (UBT) -- releases  its list of  candidates list without discussing it with the SP then he would presume three parties do not his party to be part of the Opposition grand alliance.

"We need 12 seats. After all, we are running a political party… We would like the MVA leadership to take into account the smaller allies like us into confidence before taking decisions,” Azmi said.

The rumblings within the MVA over the SP’s clamour for 12 seats – a number that is big considering its inadequate strength and reach in the poll-bound state, comes ahead of  Yadav’s visit to Maharashtra.  Yadav is expected to address a couple of rallies in Malegaon in Nashik and Dhule districts of north Maharashtra.

Talking to media persons in Lucknow, Yadav said: “I am going to Maharashtra on Friday…we want INDIA to win…we will contest with INDIA…yes, we have asked for some seats…we hope they will agree”.

Informed sources in the MVA said that the Congress had asked Rahul Gandhi to have a word with Yadav and bring down the number of seats sought by it in view of the larger unity of the Opposition MVA.