BJP and put up independent candidates in the state assembly elections held in December 2017. All his candidates had lost polls.

Recently, Mr Vaghela had toured various places, including Delhi, and declared that he will fight for removal of the BJP-led government at the centre in 2019.

In 2017, the Congress and the NCP had fought assembly elections separately. The NCP was able to win just one seat in the 182-member assembly.

If in 2019, both the parties fail to reach a seat- sharing agreement, then it will be a three-way fight on some Lok Sabha seats where Mr Vaghela and his supporters will contest as NCP candidates, the party sources said.

Mr Vaghela is a prominent OBC leader, who started his political career with the BJP.

After the BJP came to powerin 1995 in Gujarat and chose to make Keshubhai Patel chief minister instead of him, Mr Vaghela engineered a split in the saffron outfit and became the CM in 1996 with outside support of the Congress.

Later, he joined the Congress and served as Textile Minister in the Manmohan Singh government.

While in the Congress, he also served as its state unit president and Leader of Opposition in the Gujarat assembly.