Amid bracing up the challenge of accommodating multiple parties in the alliance, the Tamil Nadu Opposition party DMK has been finalizing the talks with the parties over seat-sharing for the upcoming assembly polls in the state. While the party had sealed the pact of seat-sharing with a handful of parties, DMK had on Saturday finalized the talks with Vaiko's MDMK and inked the deal with the party, which has come to the fact that the only party left in the DMK alliance without meeting a deal is the Congress party. 

On Saturday, after multiple rounds of talks, DMK had made a deal with MDMK in which the DMK had agreed to offer six assembly seats to MDMK and in exchange, the MDMK will contest in the polls in DMK's 'Rising Sun' symbol. MDMK had begun talks by demanding 12 seats from DMK but the latter had convinced Vaiko to settle for four seats by citing to accommodate other allied parties. However, MDMK didn't nod for DMK's allocation and kept the talks in deadlock. 

MDMK leadership had demanded to provide more seats and the party had held severe discussions over DMK's drive of allocation. DMDK leader Mallai Sathya had held talks with DMK Treasurer TR Baalu over reaching a consensus in seat-sharing. As the sequel of no amicable talks, the MDMK party had on Saturday held a high-level meeting with the senior leaders in Chennai during which they discussed getting more seats from DMK. Following the discussion, Vaiko had visited the DMK headquarters on Saturday evening to finalize the deal. 

During the meeting, DMK had decided to offer six assembly seats to MDMK, and MDMK candidates will be contesting in the polls in DMK's 'Rising Sun' symbol, through which MDMK has become the only major party in the DMK alliance to contest all the seats in DMK's symbol. While addressing the reporters after inking the deal, Vaiko said that he had asserted to DMK Patriarch Karunanidhi that he will stand with Stalin. MDMK will contest in DMK's symbol. He said, "We have decided to contest in Rising Sun symbol as we only have less number of days for campaigning for elections and we have signed the deal with DMK to secure the Dravidian movement."

DMK has nearly ten parties in its alliance and so far, MK Stalin has signed a deal with Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK) and offered six seats, Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) has allotted three seats, Manithaneya Makkal Katchi (MMK) has been allocated with two seats - one in independent symbol and one in DMK symbol, Communist Party of India has got six seats, and now MDMK has got six seats. 

Congress is the only major party in the alliance that is yet to reach a deal with DMK. According to reports, the grand old party has been demanding DMK to provide 40 seats and as ADMK has allotted 20 seats for BJP, the Congress party has been moving its negotiations by displaying that it is not ready to accept the deal below 35 seats. DMK is planning to contest at least 180 seats directly out of 234 while the rest of the seats will be shared by the allied parties. 

However, the Congress party is upping the ante in the alliance and initiated talks to break up the coalition with the DMK if the latter fails to accept the demand. According to reports, the Congress party is mulling to talk with actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan to join the third front as an alternative for DMK. There were some signs of Congress using the alternative on Saturday to show to the DMK that it is ready to switch side. 

The DMK party is planning to provide 18-20 seats for Congress and the strong deadlock implies that the deal between Congress and DMK is not in sight. As the state is just left with five days to witness the commencement of the filing nomination papers for the election, the parties are in full swing to complete the talks and build an alliance. The political observers say if DMK- Congress fails to make a deal by Tuesday, the state would see the drift of one of the major alliances ahead of the polls.