"What alliance is there with those who do not accept Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate?" asked Selvaperunthagai, the former president of the Tamil Nadu Congress party, dropping a bombshell that has caused intense turmoil within the 'TVK-Congress alliance'!
Following this, when Praveen Chakravarthy mocked Selvaperunthagai by asking, "Who is he?", Perunthagai, in response, ridiculed Praveen as an "intellectual" and also lashed out on X, saying, "This is an extension of the filthy, communal elitist mindset that led them to wash the stage our leader (Mallikarjun Kharge) had stood on in North India by pouring water over it after he left."
Senior leaders speaking about the background of this clash within the Tamil Nadu Congress party say, "Selvaperunthagai, who is a DMK supporter, was irritated by the 'TVK-Congress alliance.' In this situation, the TVK leaders' remarks about 'Vijay as the prime ministerial candidate' have given Perunthagai an opening to play politics.
At this time, when by-elections are underway for the Madurantakam and Dharapuram constituencies, he is portraying himself as loyal to Rahul and blowing the issue out of proportion. His goal is: 'The TVK-Congress alliance must be weakened. Through this, this alliance must be defeated in the by-election.'
It is precisely because they understood his intention that the party is also brushing aside this matter. But Praveen, who was already irritated with Perunthagai, directly mocked him in front of journalists by asking, “Who is he?” This has deeply hurt Perunthagai emotionally. That is why, saying he would respond, he not only attacked Praveen but also dragged Mallikarjun Kharge into the issue to support himself.
Selvaperundhagai does not really have any loyalty to the Congress party or to Leader Rahul. He is a DMK supporter, and after being stripped of his post, he has come to the conclusion that “it would be better to directly join the DMK.” In this situation, the party is clear that we should not create an opportunity for him ourselves,” they say.
When asked about this matter, Selvaperundhagai’s supporters said, “Even before the 2026 Assembly election, Praveen had been working with hostility to break the DMK alliance. The party leadership believed his words, and that became one of the reasons for the DMK alliance’s defeat in the election.
Even now, the leaders in the Tamil Nadu Congress who support the TVK are only nominally opposing the excesses being carried out by TVK members in projecting Vijay as the prime ministerial candidate. That is why no TVK leader has so far openly said, “We accept Rahul Gandhi as the prime ministerial candidate.”
We raised this issue even in the Congress party meeting. Those who responded said, “For 60 years, the Dravidian parties used the Congress party for their own growth, but never even let us near the Secretariat. For every recommendation, we were the ones standing on their party steps. In such a situation, if we glare at those who gave Congress a place in the Cabinet itself and walk out of the alliance, it is Rahul Gandhi’s ambition to strengthen the party in every state that will suffer,” and went on and on. “To grow the party in the state, do we really need to lose our self-respect like this and form such a shameless alliance?” they asked bitterly.
Meanwhile, Delhi sources speaking about the background of this issue say, "Rahul Gandhi and the party’s strategist Sunil are making serious efforts to strengthen the party state by state. In that context, it is essential for the Congress party to be part of the cabinet in Tamil Nadu. Otherwise, the Rahul-Sunil plan is to deal with the controversy over who the prime ministerial candidate should be in 2029."
Moreover, Sunil had already warned Rahul Gandhi that, by breaking away from the alliance and antagonizing the DMK, M.K. Stalin would build a third front against the INDIA alliance and pose stiff competition to us.
As he had warned, DMK Deputy General Secretary Kanimozhi is now meeting and holding talks one after another with North Indian leaders such as Mamata Banerjee and Uddhav Thackeray.
Since Sunil has already served as the DMK’s strategy planner, he also has a close rapport with Udhayanidhi. In that context, there has also been talk of a plan to “bring up the prime ministerial candidate issue in 2029, drop Vijay from the alliance, and get Congress to join hands with the DMK.”
In this situation, they say Rahul Gandhi is also staying quiet with the plan that “until the 2029 parliamentary election, let the Tamil Nadu Congress keep clashing like this as the support base of two parties, DMK and TVK. Two years later, depending on the situation then, we can contest the election in an alliance with either the DMK or TVK.”