"Can Stable Government Be Formed With 113 MLAs?" What Governor Asked Vijay

Superstar actor Vijay was summoned to Tamil Nadu Governor RV Arlekar's residence Thursday morning to check whether his Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam - which swept to a near-perfect debut win in last month's election - had managed to gather extra support from coalition partners overnight to form the next government.

Sources said the governor asked Vijay a series of questions, including how he might run an administration with only 113 MLAs when the House majority is 118 and which other parties might agree to back the TVK. Vijay was also asked to clarify statements about future support for his party. In turn, the actor reportedly declared himself ready to face a floor test.

Sources also said the TVK has retained legal options in the event it is refused.

The two met on Wednesday when Arlekar turned down Vijay's claim to form the government; Lok Bhavan sources later told NDTV the governor was unconvinced by the numbers on the table.

Vijay's Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam has 108 seats, 10 short of the majority mark.

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Half the shortfall will be supplied by the Congress, which has offered conditional support, the condition being the TVK will have no truck with 'communal forces', a reference to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

The other half will likely be made up by onboarding four seats from the Communist Party of India and the Communist Party of India (Marxist), as well as smaller Tamil parties like the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (two seats) and the Pattali Makkal Katchi (four). Vijay is understood to favour a coalition with the latter parties since it should make for an easier working relationship.

This combination - TVK + Congress + Left + VCK + PMK - gives Vijay 123 seats, which will drop to 122 once the actor resigns his Trichy (East) seat. Vijay contested and won from two seats.

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But there are doubts; the VCK is allied with the outgoing Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, Vijay's 'political enemy', and the PMK with the Bharatiya Janata Party, his 'ideological enemy'.

Both must break from their current alliances to join Vijay, but this appears to be the most likely route for the TVK to form the next government and for the actor to become a chief minister.

The other option is widely regarded as less likely - an alliance between the TVK and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the other half of the Dravidian binary that has dominated Tamil Nadu politics for 62 years.

There has been talk of rifts in the AIADMK on the Vijay question.

The TVK fired ferocious attacks on the DMK and BJP in campaigning for this election, setting up a 'good vs evil' narrative with Vijay as the hero. It paid rich dividends. It also dropped the AIADMK into a blind spot, of sorts.

Neither Vijay nor the TVK expressly targeted the larger party.

Perhaps as a result of that soft-peddling factions of the AIADMK were ready to ally.

Reports this morning said over a dozen - more than enough to carry the TVK over the majority mark - AIADMK legislators were ready to link up, and had shifted to a resort in Puducherry to force the issue.

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However, two AIADMK leaders told NDTV there will be no alliance, and that any talk of a deal was false. CV Shanmugam and KP Munusamy said whispers surfaced because the party's messaging had not been clear enough.

Vijay, meanwhile, is understood to be reluctant to ally given the AIADMK's ties with the BJP.

Should EPS have a change of heart, the two parties will have over 150 seats between them.

In a worst-case scenario, assuming the TVK cannot put together a strong-enough coalition, the governor could suspend the newly-elected Assembly and recommend the centre impose President's Rule, which would then lead to a fresh election.

As all of this plays out, Vijay's 107 new legislators have been sequestered at a resort in the temple town of Mamallapuram, which is around 50km from capital Chennai.

The TVK is new to the game but Vijay knows the rules.