Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) of actor Kamal Haasan has stitched together an alliance with All India Samathuva Makkal Katchi (AISMK) and Indhiya Jananayaga Katchi (IJK), positioning it as the 'First Front' for the April 6 Assembly election in Tamil Nadu.
According to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the two parties late Monday night, MNM will contest in 154 seats, while AISMK and IJK will field candidates in 40 constituencies each. A day after the agreement was signed, Kamal Haasan held a press conference along with AISMK chief and his colleague from tinsel town, R Sarathkumar, and IJK president Ravi Pachamuthu on Tuesday evening and got himself announced as the Chief Ministerial face.
“We are the First Front. We have come together for the welfare of the state and people... this is the people's front. When Mahatma Gandhi launched the freedom struggle, the rich were not part of him. Likewise, people will support us. You will know that soon,” Kamal Haasan said.
He was responding to a question on why many parties are "reluctant" to join the MNM alliance when it calls itself the 'First Front'. MNM, which scored 3.7 per cent of votes in its debut elections in 2019, projects itself as an "alternative" to the two Dravidian majors that have ruled Tamil Nadu alternatively since 1967.
Haasan said he was opposed to both the AIADMK and the DMK, while he apparently kept the options open if actor Vijayakanth's DMDK expresses interest in joining his alliance. "We will welcome people when they come to us. We will find space for them," he said.
Meanwhile, MNM Vice-President V Ponraj, who was Scientific Advisor to former president A P J Abdul Kalam, invited the DMDK to join the alliance led by his party.
The DMDK quit the AIADMK-BJP alliance on Tuesday after talks failed.