Vishwanath, Sa Ra again in a slanging match

Bengaluru: Hitting another low in state politics, former JD(S) leader   A.H. Vishwanath and  party MLA  Sa Ra Mahesh have been sparring in public  of late. Ever since Mr Vishwanath resigned from the assembly to bring down the Kumaraswamy government and was disqualified by the Speaker,  he has been holding Mr Mahesh responsible for his exit from the party.

He has not taken kindly to Mr Mahesh’s charges  on the floor of the Assembly that he had ‘sold’ himself to the BJP to topple the coalition government and took strong objection recently to  him  being given a prominent party post. Hitting out at JD(S) leaders for promoting Mr Mahesh, he claimed he had failed to strengthen the party on his home turf and engineered a feud  in the Gowda family.

Retaliating,  Mr Mahesh accused Mr Vishwanath of stabbing former CM H.D. Kumaraswamy in the back just because he was offered some  money from the BJP to bring down the coalition government. Claiming to have brought Mr Vishwanath to the JD(S) and offering him president's post presuming he would be loyal to its supremo Deve Gowda and Mr Kumaraswamy, he said he showed his true colours when he joined hands with the rebel legislators to topple the government.

Meanwhile, the case of disqualified MLAs will come up for hearing in the SC on Tuesday.