Is There A Disquiet In Cong Over DMK Tie-Up?
Congress MP Jothimani was highly agitated when DMK leader V Senthil Balaji engineered a defection of a few leaders, including a woman district office-bearer of the Congress in Karur, to the DMK recently. The MP called it unethical and launched a broadside against the DMK, saying that it was not acceptable: Reports
CHENNAI: The political muscle flexing by Congress district president of Perambalur, R V J Suresh, who said on Thursday that the DMK would bite dust in the 2026 Assembly elections without the support of the Congress and that his party was ready to go it alone without the DMK alliance is just the latest of various ramblings indicating a growing disquiet among Congress leaders in the State over the coalition.
Though the TNCC president K Selvaperunthogai has been firmly in favour of continuing in the DMK-led coalition and the DMK leaders are supporting him to the hilt – on Thursday it was DMK deputy general secretary A Raja who took up the cudgels on his behalf him by hitting out at AIADMK general secretary Edappadi K Palaniswami for his derogatory remarks – several voices of protests have been raised by other leaders.
A slew of Congress leaders, in the past few days, have been expressing the view that their party should demand more number of seats – they were allotted just 25 seats in 2021 – and also a share in power if the coalition romps home in the election in 2026. Among them were the Congress leader in the State Assembly Rajeshkumar and former TNCC president K S Alagiri.
Congress MP Jothimani was highly agitated when DMK leader V Senthil Balaji engineered a defection of a few leaders, including a woman district office-bearer of the Congress in Karur, to the DMK recently. The MP called it unethical and launched a broadside against the DMK, saying that it was not acceptable.
Jothimani was among the State Congress leaders, whose acrimonious tirade against DMK MP, Tirichi Siva, in July needed the intervention of Chief Minister M K Stalin to put an end to the controversy. Congress leaders, including Rajeshkumar, had reacted angrily to Siva’s statement that the late K Kamaraj was using air conditioner and claimed that the former Chief Minister and All India Congress president was a man of simple needs.
Though that controversy died down, the Congress leaders like Rajeshkumar were raising the demand for more seats when AICC leader Girish Chodankar spoke at a meeting in Tirunelveli recently that the Congress was prepared to contest in 117 seats in the Assembly elections though it could actually fight it out in more constituencies, opening a Pandora’s Box.
It came handy for Palaniswami to claim that there was a rift in the DMK-led coalition, which was substantiated by the statements of some other Congress leaders like Trichy Velusamy, who were making open demands for more seats and share in power from the DMK.
When the Kamaraj’s air conditioner controversy was brewing Selvaperunthogai called on Stalin at the Anna Arivalayam and it was he who has been consistently defending the coalition status quo even when Chodankar stirred the hornet’s nest by clarifying that there was no such demand from the Congress high command.
But speculations were rife that Chodankar had spoken to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi before coming down to Tirunelveli and that Aadhav Arjuna, a prominent leader in the Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam of Vijay had met AICC leader K C Venugopal recently and offered even the deputy Chief Minister post if they could face the elections together and come to power.
DMK sources, however, dispel all the speculations as untenable and say that the final decisions would be taken only by top Congress leaders like Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi, with whom Stalin