DMK Reaches Pact With Congress, Allots 25 Seats to Ally for Tamil Nadu Elections

Chennai: The DMK and Congress signed a seat sharing agreement where it was decided that the latter would contest from 25 seats in Tamil Nadu. The two parties settled at 25 following a one-hour meeting between the two parties at DMK President MK Stalin’s residence. The DMK has offered the Kanyakumari Lok Sabha bypoll seat to its ally.

The Kanyakumari seat fell vacant after the demise of H Vasanthakumar. The BJP has nominated former Union Minister Pon Radhakrishnan to contest from this constituency while Congress MK Karti Chidambaram has filed an application seeking a ticket for party leader Priyanka Gandhi for the Kanyakumari Lok Sabha bypoll

“Our alliance will sweep polls this time. We will send out a strong message to the BJP that Tamil Nadu will show the way to stop the Modi Raj,” said Congress Tamil Nadu in-charge Dinesh Gundu Rao.

Congress contested in 41 seats in 2016 state assembly polls and won eight seats.

The DMK-Congress seat-sharing talks reached a roadblock on Friday as the DMK was not read to give in to Congress’s demand of 30 seats. Congress sources said the leaders were ‘hurt’ with the way the DMK treated its leaders during the two rounds of negotiation. Congress State President KS Alagiri broke down while narrating the treatment meted out to his team at the DMK party headquarters, sources said. The DMK sources maintained that party was not keen to offer more seats to the Congress this time as the top brass thought it could become a ‘repeat of 2016’.

However, late on Saturday night, the alliance talks progressed and the deal was sealed after the two parties settled on a number for the upcoming elections, sources from both sides confirmed to News 18.

The DMK has allotted six seats each for the VCK, CPI and MDMK, three forIUML and two for MMK.

Talks with the CPI(M) remained inconclusive as of Saturday.