Civic polls: Pact with NDA to stay, hints AIADMK

“The issue was discussed threadbare when RSS ideologue S Gurumurthy posted a controversial tweet stating AIADMK lost seats by more than 5 lakh votes, but the party top brass decided to continue with the BJP,” a senior AIADMK leader said.

The party benefitted in the Assembly polls due to an alliance with the PMK and other parties and based on this the AIADMK is to share seats in the civic polls, the AIADMK leader told DT Next. Even as there are a few district secretaries and MLAs unhappy with the BJP and DMDK, the majority of the seniors want the mega alliance to continue in the upcoming polls to local bodies and Nangunery Assembly seat.

“Though there are dissenting voices from former Union minister Pon Radhakrishnan and Gurumurthy, the alliance is likely to continue as AIADMK leaders are in the good books of Modi and Shah,” a BJP office-bearer concurred. “TN general secretary Tamilisai Soundararajan has already said that the alliance will continue and we too wish that it continues,” BJP state secretary KT Raghavan said.