New Delhi [India], May 8 : A day after Congress dumped DMK and decided to support Vijay's Tamilaga Vetri Kazhagam (TVK) to form a government in Tamil Nadu, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Friday attacked Congress and reiterated his commitment to the INDIA bloc in times of difficulty.
His jibe came a day after Akhilesh Yadav met TMC chief Mamata Banerjee and her nephew Abhishek Banerjee in Kolkata after TMC's Bengal rout.
He shared the pictures himself along with TMC chief Mamata Banerjee and DMK supremo MK Stalin on X and said, "We are not the ones who abandon each other in times of difficulty"
https://x.com/yadavakhilesh/status/2052621491800625198?s=20
Congress has offered conditional support to the TVK's Vijay to form a government in Tamil Nadu and severed its ties with the DMK. Vijay's TVK has been working to garner support from other parties to form a government in Tamil Nadu since the verdict delivered a fractured mandate.
With the support of five Congress MLAs, the alliance stands at 112, still six short of the majority mark of 118 in the 234-member assembly.
Meanwhile, the executive committee meeting of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), being held in Chennai, is currently underway amid ongoing discussions over government formation in Tamil Nadu.
Parallely, the Communist Party of India (CPI) working is also being held at the party office in Chennai. Both, the Left Parties have two seats each in the State Assembly. Later in the day, both the left parties will meet with leaders of the VCK where a final call will be taken on offering support to the TVK. The VCK also has two seats in the assembly. If the three parties offer support to Vijay his front will easily cross the halfway mark of 117 seats.
On Thursday night, Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam Joint General Secretary CTR Nirmal Kumar, accompanied by party leaders, met with the Communist Party of India leaders at the CPI office in Chennai on Thursday, to garner the support for making goverment in Tamil Nadu.
Earlier, CPI (M) leader P Shanmugam on Thursday said that his party has received a letter from Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) chief Vijay, on which discussion will be held in the party's state committee meeting.
"TVK Chief sent a letter to our party. Our State Committee meeting will be held tomorrow morning; we will make our decision in it," said Shanmugam.
According to the Constitution, it is TVK that should be allowed to form the government. We have never seen a situation like this in the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, and now we have a hung Assembly. It is the Governor who should invite Vijay to form the government because he is leading," Shanmugam said.
He criticised the Governor's stance, saying, "The Governor is now saying that there is a High Court order, which is not right."
The Tamil Nadu unit of Communist Party of India has also urged the Governor to act in order of the Constitution and noted that it is "inappropriate" for him to ask Vijay to prove his majority before swearing in.
"In the 2026 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election held on April 23 in Tamil Nadu, voters did not deliver a clear mandate enabling any single party to independently form the government. However, the electorate has given Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam 108 seats, making it the single largest party in the Assembly. Based on this, TVK leader Vijay has met the Governor and staked a claim to form the government. It is not appropriate for the Governor to insist that TVK prove its majority before the swearing-in ceremony," CPI said in its statement.
The series of meetings comes amid intense political deliberations following the hung verdict in the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections.
TVK stunned the 'Dravidian' parties in the State, bringing to an end the DMK-AIADMK three- decade-old 'duopoly'. .