The Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam on Thursday joined the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led Secular Progressive Alliance in Tamil Nadu ahead of the Assembly elections.

This is the first time that the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam has joined the alliance.

The polls are expected to be held in April or May.

Apart from the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the state-level Secular Progressive Alliance includes the Congress, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Communist Party of India and the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi.

On Thursday, Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam General Secretary Premalatha Vijayakanth, along with party leaders, met DMK chief and Chief Minister MK Stalin in Chennai. Premalatha Vijayakanth announced after the meeting that the tie-up had been finalised, ANI reported.

“Our party cadres also wished for this alliance,” the news agency quoted her Premalatha Vijayakanth saying. “It should have been formed when Captain Vijayakanth [her husband] was alive.”

The talks on the seat-sharing arrangement for the state polls will be finalised after both parties form their election committees.

Vijayaraj Alagarswami, an actor and former MLA who was also known as Captain Vijayakanth, founded the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam in 2005. He died in December 2023.

In the previous Assembly polls held in 2021, the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam had allied with TTV Dhinakaran-led Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam and had failed to win any seat.

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led alliance had won the polls, ending the decade-long tenure of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.

In January, the Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam returned to the state-level National Democratic Alliance comprising mainly the Bharatiya Janata Party and the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.