Talks with TVK failed due to steep poll demands: AIADMK

The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) had first held unsuccessful talks with actor Vijay's newly launched party the Tamizhaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) from early last year before reviving its alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on April 11, according to senior leaders from both parties.

- Divya Chandrababu

CHENNAI:

A senior AIADMK leader aware of the talks said that despite being a political greenhorn TVK's demands were steep. "TVK wanted to contest in half of the 234 assembly seats and to run the government for the first 2.5 years (if the alliance won)," a senior AIADMK leader said.

Ever since Vijay launched TVK last year to debut in the 2026 assembly elections, the ruling DMK, opposition AIADMK and political parties in Tamil Nadu have been worried about Vijay eating into their vote bank among youngsters, women, and anti-DMK votes given his cult status in Tamil cinema-- which he quit at his peak to enter politics.

TVK's internal assessment is that their vote share will be 18%, which is largely based on a C-voter survey in March, those in the know of the matter said. It showed that after incumbent chief minister and DMK president M K Stalin (27%), Vijay was the second most preferred chief ministerial candidate with 18% voting followed by AIADMK general secretary Edappadi Palaniswami (EPS)-10% and BJP's former state president K Annamalai (9%).

To put that in perspective, a major chunk of the votes here is shared between the DMK and AIADMK, the two parties who have ruled Tamil Nadu alternatively since 1967.