Faced with the new-found confidence of the 206-strong Congress in the 261-member United Progressive Alliance (UPA), the Dravida Munnettra Kazhagam (DMK), with 18 MPs, said it may not join the government but support it from outside if its MPs were not given the portfolios it wanted.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, Congress President and UPA chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will meet for the last time tomorrow morning before Singh goes to President Pratibha Patil with the list of ministers to be sworn in at the Ashoka Hall at 5.30 pm.
The crisis is both over the portfolios to be given to the party and the men who should be made ministers. The prime minister does not want A Raja and T R Baalu, respectively former ministers of telecom and roads and shipping, to get the same ministries in view of their chequered performance the last time.
He is also not enthusiastic about the fact that the DMK has asked for ministries for the whole Karunanidhi clan: son Azhagiri, daughter Kanimozhi, nephew Dayanidhi Maran and distant relative Helen Davidson, who has won from Kanniyakumari.
If the matter is not settled at tomorrow’s meeting, the two parties may replicate the arrangement in the Tamil Nadu state Assembly. There, 35 MLAs of the Congress are helping keep afloat 95 MLAs of the DMK in a 235-member House. However, Congress MLAs provide only outside support without joining the government.