Chennai: Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi, after hitting a roadblock in first round of seat sharing talks with DMK for Lok Sabha polls, is expected to meet senior DMK leaders tomorrow for second round of talks at Anna Arivalayam.
VCK has demanded 4 seats but had said that it would be happy to settle for a minimum of three seats, one more than the number it had contested in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The VCK has argued that the party has grown in strength and more importantly, has contributed a lot in shaping INDIA alliance’s ideological make-up. However DMK was not keen on giving more than 2 seats for Thirumavalavan’s party in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
Reports say that committee members of VCK who met recently felt that they should get at least 3 seats (2 reserved and one general constituency).
Meanwhile, there were rumours doing rounds that VCK may part ways with DMK if their demands are not met and would join hands with the AIADMK. Putting rest to all speculations, Thirumavalavan asserted that his party would only face the ensuing Parliamentary election only in the INDIA alliance led by DMK in Tamil Nadu and other parties shall not wait in vain for a division in the alliance.
He said, “We cannot hurry because some people are speculating. There is no pressing need for us to hurry. We are in an alliance. We will continue to be in the alliance. We will face the election in the DMK led INDIA bloc. There is no second thought on that.”
Adding that the VCK has no need to exert indirect pressure and it has the right and need to seek more seats from DMK, Thirumavalavan said, “We will hold negotiations to firm the deal”.
On the AIADMK sending feelers to the Congress, he said, “The national-level alliance called INDIA bloc is led by the Congress. Our TN chief minister has a major role in bringing the parties together. Hence, no one shall nurture dreams of a friction in the DMK-Congress ties owing to the ongoing talks. The need does not arise. It might get delayed by a day or two. No gap would be created between the allies. No other party shall wait in vain.”
Interacting with the media, AIADMK’s organisation secretary and former Fisheries Minister D Jayakumar said “If they [VCK] come to us, they will benefit. If they remain with the DMK, they won’t get any seats. “
During the 2006 Assembly poll, the VCK was part of the AIADMK-led coalition and it won two seats (Kattumannarkoil and Mangalore) out of the nine it contested. It polled 4.26 lakh votes with about 1.3% in the vote shares.
