Left to decide on ties with AIADMK today

Frustrated over the lack of progress in seat sharing talks with the ruling All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, (AIADMK), the two left parties in Tamil Nadu said they will decide their future course of action on Thursday.

“The party’s executive committee will meet in Chennai tomorrow (Thursday) to decide. You will have to wait for some more time,” D Pandian, state secretary of Communist Party of  India (CPI) said.

G Ramakrishnan, state secretary of Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), said there has been no progress in the seat sharing talks with AIADMK in the past 15 days.

 He said there will be a meeting with the CPI on Thursday to decide on the next course of action. However, both the leaders were not willing to comment on snapping ties with the AIADMK.

Pandian said AIADMK repeated what it did during the 2011 Assembly elections — announcing the names of the party’s candidates for 160 seats even when seat sharing talks were in progress.

Like the previous election, Jayalalitha has announced the party’s candidates for all the 40 Lok Sabha seats (39 in Tamil Nadu and one Puducherry) declaring that the party’s candidates would withdraw in favour of allies once the seat sharing deals conclude.

 However, she said that once the deal is finalised and the seats identified, some of the AIADMK candidates will be withdrawn to enable the alliance parties to field its candidates'.She also said that her party is satisfied with the two allies to fight the elections.