Mumbai, Feb. 19 -- After months of posturing and covert hard bargaining, the ruling BJP and the Shiv Sena on Monday night came to a formal undertaking between them on forging an alliance to contest the forthcoming Lok Sabha and the State Assembly polls in Maharashtra, after taking into account their "common ideology" and "nationalistic outlook".

A little over a year after it had announced that it would contest both the Lok Sabha and Assembly on its own strength, the Shiv Sena came around to strike a seat-sharing deal with the BJP for both the Lok Sabha and the State Assembly polls, in line with its insistence that the seat-sharing for both the polls be linked so that there is no misunderstanding between them in the run-up to the Assembly...