It was widely speculated that he would contest the Sivakasi constituency, but he fielded his party colleague R Gnanadas from there and former Union Minister and party treasurer M Kannappan from Thondamuthur.

The MDMK, contesting from 35 constituencies in alliance with the ruling AIADMK, has accomodated four of eight partymen arrested under POTA along with Mr Vaiko.

A Ganesamurthy, Bhoominathan, Veera Ilavarasan and Sivandhiayappan are the four detenus, who are on bail. They would contest from Vellakoil, Madurai West, Thirumangalam and Sivaganga respectively.

Mallai Sathya (Egmore), Somu (Tambaram), Nazareth Durai (Sathankulam), Malarmannan (Tiruchirapalli-I) Vijaya Thayanban (Anna Nagar) and D R R Senguttuvan are the other prominent party leaders given seats. The MDMK is locking horns with the DMK in 16 constituencies.

Mr Vaiko, after introducing the candidates and releasing the party manifesto at a public meeting here, kicked off his 35 day-long campaign. It was from the same venue that he released the list of candidates for the May 2004 Lok Sabha poll, where he won all four seats contested.

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