Talking politics? D K Shivakumar seeks the blessing of BJP leader S M Krishna

Bengaluru: Water Resources Minister and Congress strongman, D. K. Shivakumar's surprise visit to BJP leader and former external affairs minister S.M. Krishna’s residence on Tuesday has set political circles abuzz.

Mr Krishna is known to be the political mentor of Mr Shivakumar when he was in the Congress. So the visit made people curious with a section of political circles asserting that something major might happen prior to the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. Others wondered if Mr Krishna was planning to return to the Congress.

However, sources close to Mr Shivakumar rubbished these claims stating that all the rumours were false adding that Mr Shivakumar had only met Mr Krishna to greet him on the occasion of the new year and also seek his mentor's blessings.

Mr Krishna had joined the BJP in March 2017 alleging that he has been sidelined in the Congress. In recent months, reports have started doing the rounds that  Mr Krishna was sidelined by the BJP too during the assembly elections in May 2018.

Meanwhile, when asked about former minister and dissident Congress MLA, Ramesh Jarkiholi "going missing" for more than a week, Mr Shivakumar quipped that the media should pose the question on the whereabouts of Mr Jarkiholi to BJP state president, B. S. Yeddyurappa.

Speaking to reporters here, Mr Shivakumar cryptically said, "In politics nothing is permanent, those who go up will have to come down. Let the BJP know this, they will not remain in power forever and this applies to us too."

The minister added that though Mr Yeddyurappa keeps saying that they will not carry out ‘Operation Lotus,’ his party leaders like former ministers B. Sriramulu, Umesh Katti and former CM Jagadish Shettar give the opposite impression.  

Strongly defending the proposed steel flyover project, Mr Shivakumar asserted that the  BJP was unnecessarily making baseless charges about the project.  "Instead of blackmailing the state government, why should  the BJP not guide and give us suggestions?" he asked angrily. 

He contended that the state government will not sit quiet just because there is opposition to the project. " The more work we do, the more the enemies. The opposition can't scare the state government by politicising every issue," he snapped.

Mr Shivakumar added that if it was him in charge, he wouldn't have shelved the project last year. "The government should definitely reconsider the project as it  will ease the traffic situation to a large extent. Our main aim is to reduce the travel time to North Bengaluru. If a child has to be dropped at school at 8 am, the parent and the child have to wake up at 5 am. It's the state government's responsibility to ease the traffic situation. Time is money. It is everything.”