Chennai: For the first time in the recent years, bitterness between alliance partners DMK and Congress came out in open Friday evening, when the latter accused the former of not allocating ”fair number of seats” to it in the civic polls in Tamilnadu.
In a joint statement here, TNCC president K S Alagiri and Congress Legislature Party leader K R Ramasamy said their party not getting adequate number of posts of local bodies chiefs was against ”coalition dharma”.
Though Alagiri today said ”all is well” in the alliance, this rare public display of displeasure by the State
Congress against the DMK, which came a day ahead of the indirect elections to the posts of Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons of rural local bodies in 27 districts, clearly indicated the fissures between the friends.
The Congress said the party faced the rural local body polls, held in two phases last month, without any agreement right from the start ”but there was no cooperation at the district level.”
”Of the 27 district panchayat chief posts, not even one, not even that of a Vice-President has been given to us so far. We regret to inform this is against coalition dharma,” Alagiri and Ramasamy said.
Same was the case with panchayat union posts where the party has been allotted just two of the 303 posts, they added.
They alleged the ”Congress has been denied opportunity’ in seats that where even recommended by the DMK leadership apparently to the local level functionaries”.
Sources in Congress said the State leadership has conveyed the above details to the Delhi high command, which has given an assurance to sort out the issue by holding talks with the DMK top brass.
Meanwhile, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram has batted for the continuance of the alliance. Stating that Alagiri has expressed his anguish over less seats allotted to the party, Chidambaram said he expected that the DMK would allot more seats in the coming days. He said that the alliance remained strong and it would continue.
(With PTI inputs)