Senior Congress leader and former Union home minister P Chidambaram on Sunday said Tamil Nadu lost an opportunity to announce to the world that there is a consensus regarding delimitation, referring to the absence of the opposition parties in the meeting of state MPs called by chief minister C Joseph Vijay.HT ImageVarious parties including the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), boycotted the meeting called by the ruling Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) on Saturday, dismissing it as “unnecessary”. The meeting explored the possibilities of delimitation’s impact on Tamil Nadu as the Centre might conduct a special session in the Parliament on delimitation.“It saddened me that the DMK, AIADMK, PMK, DMDK did not participate in the meeting of the Tamil Nadu Members of Parliament convened by the chief minister of Tamil Nadu. We lost an opportunity to announce to the world that there is a consensus in Tamil Nadu regarding delimitation,” P Chidambaram said in a social media post on Sunday.Claiming that unity among political parties prevailed on delimitation in April this year, he said, “People must ask the question why the unity in April shattered in August”. “Every party must clearly state its stance on the Delimitation bill,” he added.In April, former Tamil Nadu chief minister MK Stalin burnt a copy of the delimitation Bill and described it as a ”black law” that would make Tamil people refugees on their own land.Tamil Nadu Congress Committee president Manickam Tagore said those who place their politics above Tamil Nadu’s interest did not chose to attend and those who put the state first and politics second, attended the all-party meeting called by the chief minister.Terming that the meeting was not about “party politics”, he said it is about Tamil Nadu’s rights, interests and future. “The people of Tamil Nadu are watching, and they will remember who stood with Tamil Nadu when it mattered.”Meanwhile, the AIADMK national spokesperson Kovai Sathyan commenting about the TVK government holding the meeting with Tamil Nadu MPs said, “The actions of TVK reflect political immaturity and theatrics, nothing else. There is an organisational structure and we have a general secretary in place. Whatever happens, it happens through him. Reaching out directly to the MPs is not the norm.”He asked whether the TVK would agree if any other party or any other person reached out to TVK’s office bearers directly without the order of high command. “This is political immaturity and misplaced priorities,” he said.On the reasons why the DMK skipped the meeting, the party’s national spokesperson Saravanan Annadurai said, “The DMK’s stance is that delimitation should not be conducted.”Elaborating, Annadurai said, “In 2025, during DMK rule, an all-party meeting was convened and resolutions were passed. The first recommendation was: when delimitation came in 2001, it was frozen for 25 years and pushed to 2026; now, freeze it for another 25 years from 2026. Why? Because the population has not yet balanced, and the population in Northern states remains higher — that is one demand.”“Tamil Nadu should not face any impact, and the current political weightage must not be diluted. If we look at it now, there are 39 constituencies. Out of 534 constituencies, 39 represents 7.2%. Whether you increase or decrease the total count now, this 7.2% share must not decrease. And that is the DMK’s stance,” he added.However, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rejected allegations that the delimitation exercise is a “conspiracy against Tamil Nadu”.The party’s spokesperson Narayanan Thirupathy said, “It is a constitutional process applicable to the entire country.Article 82 and 170 of the Constitution mandate periodic readjustment of seats on the basis of population to uphold the fundamental democratic principle of ‘one person, one vote, one value’. It is not a Tamil Nadu specific exercise,” he said.Stressing that the people of Tamil Nadu deserve responsible leadership that understands the Constitution, Thirupathy said, “The BJP stands firmly for fair, transparent and constitutionally mandated delimitation for the whole of India — not selective exemptions based on political convenience”.