Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (DMDK) leader Vijayakant remains cold to overtures made by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) to rope in his party in its alliance for the Lok Sabha polls.
A top DMK leader said his party decided to field ‘Tiruchi’ N. Siva as its candidate for the Rajya Sabha election as it did not get any positive signal from the actor-turned-politician.
Mr Siva, elected to the Rajya Sabha twice in the past, is likely to file his nominations on January 21.
“We actually wanted to keep the seat open for the DMDK in the hope he (Mr. Vijayakant) would respond to our call for an alliance. But we are not able to establish any contact directly with him,” said the senior DMK leader.
Asked whether the DMK would consider an alliance with the Congress if Mr. Vijayakant decided against joining the DMK combine, the leader said the chances were remote.
“Rather, we will go to the polls with our existing allies. When there is multi-cornered contest, it will benefit us immensely,” he said, rejecting the suggestion that the presence of the Congress was necessary to put together a combination to take on the ruling AIADMK. Though the DMK has named its candidate, it has not completely shut the door on the DMDK.
DMK sources sought to play down the recent diatribe by former Union Minister M.K. Alagiri against party treasurer M.K. Stalin, saying there was nothing new in Mr. Alagiri’s stand.
