By IANS,
Chennai : Tamil Nadu’s major opposition party AIADMK Friday inked seat sharing deals with five of its allies and also signalled to other allies it would reconsider its earlier choice of contesting 160 constituencies on its own.
AIADMK general secretary J. Jayalalithaa met the leaders of MNMK, SMK, AIMMK, RPI, TNKYF and finalised eight seats for the allies in the April 13 assembly elections.
Faced with the prospect of its major allies not only breaking away but also teaming up and opposing the party, the AIADMK leadership was in a conciliatory mood and decided to reconsider its earlier decision to contest 160 of the 234 seats at stake in the assembly elections.
It is also learnt the AIADMK is willing to accommodate the Vaiko-led MDMK by offering it 15 seats, up from nine offered earlier.
Queried about AIADMK’s offer, an MDMK official told IANS that the party would decide its course of action March 19 at its district secretaries’ meeting.
It was a day of hectic consultations between the leaders of AIADMK and its allies.
The AIADMK team met the leaders of the Communist Party of India (CPI), Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), DMDK and other allies and held detailed discussions to work out a revised formula.
“The AIADMK is saying the list was issued owing to some mix-up,” a CPI leader told IANS.
Later in the day, leaders of the CPI-M, CPI and DMDK met Jayalalithaa at her Poes Garden residence.
The DMDK team led by its presidium chairman Panruti S. Ramachandran gave Jayalalithaa its constituency wish list.
Trouble arose for AIADMK after it Wednesday unilaterally released the list of constituencies it would contest even while discussions were going on with allies on the seats the AIADMK would cede to them to contest.
Most of the parties in the AIADMK front were furious Thursday on seeing the list.
The AIADMK list included many seats currently held by the Left parties and also those requested by them and other allies like the DMDK, led by actor-turned-politician Vijayakant.
Most upset in the alliance were the DMDK, the CPI-M, CPI, MMK and the Forward Bloc (FB).
The leaders say the AIADMK had no business announcing which 160 seats it would contest when discussions on seat sharing were still on.
On Thursday, leaders of the Left and some smaller parties met here amid indications that at least a few of them favoured forming a Third Front to take on both the AIADMK and the ruling DMK.
The AIADMK had said it decided to contest 160 seats, leaving the remaining 74 for its 10 allies: DMDK (41), CPI-M (12), CPI (10), MNMK (3), PT (2), SMK (2), RPI (1), FB (1), KYF (1) and AIMMK (1).
With the announcement, the AIADMK had dumped its long-time ally, the MDMK which also upset the allies.