CPI asks PMK to end row over RS seat

Chennai, Mar 6 (UNI) Communist Party of India (CPI) Tamil Nadu unit Secretary D Pandian today appealed to the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) to give up its demand for a seat and extend its support to the DMK and its allies in the forthcoming Rajya Sabha elections from the state Assembly for six seats.

Talking to newspersons here, he said the PMK, having secured a Rajya Sabha seat in 2004, should offer its support to help the Congress to win two seats.

The DMK President and Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, rejecting PMK's claim for a seat, had declared that the DMK and the Congress would contest two seats each while one seat would be given to the CPI(M).

Referring to PMK founder-leader S Ramadoss's claim that the CPI was given a Rajya Sabha seat last year in the ''absence of any agreement,'' he said the party high command had signed an electoral pact with the DMK during the 2006 assembly elections to allot a seat to party's National Secretary D Raja.

All the allies in the DMK-led Democratic Progressive Alliance (DPA) were aware of the pact and it was wrong on the part of Dr Ramadoss to say that the CPI was given a seat in the absence of any agreement.

Mr Pandian the Left parties would organise a massive agitation if the Centre did not come forward to complete the implementation of Sethusamudram Shipping Channel Project (SSCP) at the earliest.

Mr Pandian condemned the killing of party's Mannargudi Panchayat President, when he tried to put an end to illicit liquor in the area. The party would organise a protest meeting against the murder in Thiruvarur on March 9, he said.

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