M A I N   N E W S

TMC, Cong set to team up with AIADMK

Chennai, March 8
The Tamil Maanila Congress (TMC), and the Congress combine is set to team up with the AIADMK-led front in Tamil Nadu with or without an alliance with the front in the Union Territory of Pondicherry.

TMC sources said the party was awaiting the Congress high command’s endorsement of the proposal.

Newspersons had gathered in strength at Sathyamoorthy Bhavan, headquarters of the TMC, as TMC President G. K. Moopanar arrived there after days of consultations with party colleagues and others at his house.

The sources said Mr Moopanar left the office after a meeting with the party’s election committee without making any announcement as the much awaited word from the Congress high command had not come.

Every time his mobile phone rang, there was expectation that the call was from Delhi.

The party had arranged distribution of sweets to the media apparently to mark the announcement.

AIADMK General Secretary J. Jayalalitha had offered 45 seats to the TMC-Congress combine. The sources said she was likely to raise it to 50 (40 for the TMC and 10 for the Congress or whichever way the TMC wanted to share them).

The TMC is for delinking Pondicherry from Tamil Nadu so that the Congress now heading the coalition there can fight the election along with the TMC and other parties and try to form a government. The Congress will not have to worry about the PMK factor. Ms Jayalalitha has agreed to the PMK heading the government in the first two and a half years if the AIADMK-led alliance wins. Ms Jayalalitha herself is agreeable to the delinking formula.

The admission of the PMK into the AIADMK-led front and the AIADMK’s offer of 10 seats in Pondicherry to that party with the offer of Chief Ministership for the first two and a half years had put hurdles in the path of the combine arriving at an agreement with the AIADMK.

The Congress which questioned the very admission of the “pro-LTTE PMK’’ into the front was firm that it would not share power with the PMK in Pondicherry.

The delink proposal is meant to circumvent this problem.

This will not pose any problem in Tamil Nadu since Ms Jayalalitha is not for sharing power with any party in case the alliance wins.

Congressmen in Pondicherry are still vehemently opposed to any tie-up there with the AIADMK front unless the combine is given a minimum of 20 of the 30 seats.

This was articulated by PCC President V. Narayanasami in a chat with newspersons in Pondicherry today.

However, once the Congress high command takes a decision one way or the other, the local unit is expected to fall in line.

The Left parties themselves are unhappy with the dominant position offered to the PMK in Pondicherry, where it is yet to prove its support base.

The Left parties are unhappy in Tamil Nadu as well. They have been offered six seats each. Indications are that they may be given eight seats each when the final tally emerges. UNI