India, Dec. 16 -- A phone call from NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) executive president and Baramati MP Supriya Sule has set the stage for the first round of talks between the two rival Nationalist Congress Party factions ahead of the Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation elections. Sule's push to prevent a split in the traditional NCP vote comes a day after chief minister Devendra Fadnavis announced that the BJP would contest the civic polls independently, without its Mahayuti allies, in Pune and Pimpri-Chinchwad.

Leaders of the Ajit Pawar-led NCP and the Sharad Pawar-led NCP met in Pimpri Chinchwad on Tuesday, signalling early efforts to coordinate at the local level to prevent the BJP from gaining an advantage from a divided opposition vot...