DMK plays safe in allocation of constituencies to its allies

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) announced its seat-sharing arrangement with its allies in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry on Friday for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

With the polls slated for April 18 in the state and the neighbouring union territory, the Opposition DMK has played it safe by satisfying all its alliance partners. A senior Congress leader, speaking on condition of anonymity, said despite having great ambitions for the Krishnagiri constituency, the DMK gave away the seat to the national party on the request of the party’s leadership.

The other eight constituencies — Thiruvallur, Krishnagiri, Arani, Karur, Tiruchirappalli, Sivaganga, Theni, Virudhunagar, Kanyakumari and the lone Puducherry seat have also been assigned to the Congress. Earlier in the month, the DMK had allocated 10 seats for the Congress party.

The DMK has retained all the three urban constituencies in and around in Chennai — North, South and Central, its traditional strongholds. Apart from Chennai which is in the northern part of the state, DMK has kept for itself some of the major northern constituencies — Sriperumbudur, Kancheepuram (Reserved), Arakkonam, Vellore, Dharmapuri, Tiruvannamalai, and Kallakurichi.

Apart from Kancheepuram — Nilgiris and Thenkasi are the other reserved constituencies that DMK has decided to field its candidates. This could mean that the DMK intends to field A Raja from Nilgiris who has contested from the seat earlier and had come second in 2014 parliamentary polls.

Salem, Pollachi, Dindigul, Cuddalore, Mayiladuthurai, Thanjavur, Thoothukudi, Tirunelveli, are the other seats from where DMK would contest.

While the CPI gets Tiruppur and Nagapattinam, the CPI(M) has been allotted Coimbatore and Madurai.

VCK which garners a majority of support from the Scheduled Caste Paraiyar vote bank has been allotted two reserved seats — Chidambaram and Villupuram, the two constituencies that the party’s president Thol Thirumavalavan had asked for. Thirumavalavan had also expressed his desire to contest from Chidambaram.

Eyeing on the Gounder votes in the western region, the ER Eswaran’s Kongunadu Makkal Desiya Katchi (KMDK) has been given Namakkal, where the party has a presence.

Considering the Muslim minority votes Ramanathapuram seat has been allocated to the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML). The Indiya Jananayaka Katchi (IJK) founded by TR Pachamuthu has been given the Perambalur seat.

Following the announcement of seat allocation, the CPI(M), the CPI and the IUML have declared the name of their respective candidates.

While CPI(M) has nominated PR Natarajan for Coimbatore, Sahitya Akademi writer S Venkatesan would contest from Madurai. Tiruppur has been allocated for K Subbarayan and Nagapattinam for M Selvaraj by the CPI. The IUML has announced K Nawaz Gani as its candidate for the Ramanathapuram seat.

Both IJK and KMDK have agreed to DMK’s request to contest from the party’s ‘Rising Sun’ symbol. Along with the Lok Sabha polls, Tamil Nadu will also witness bye elections to the 18 constituencies on April 18 in which DMK would contest all the seats.