BENGALURU: The Bharatiya Janata Party MLC and former minister A.H. Vishwanath on Tuesday called upon Congress leader and former chief minister Siddaramaiah at his residence in Bengaluru to inquire about the latter’s health leading to speculations that the meeting between the two leaders might have political significance attached to it.
Siddaramaiah underwent a minor surgery related to piles at a private hospital a couple of days back and has been discharged from hospital. Doctors have advised rest for Siddaramaiah.
Though in the pretext of a health inquiry, the meeting between Siddaramaiah and Vishwanath has given support to speculations that Vishwanath might be getting closer to rejoining the Congress party. Vishwanath, a former Congress minister, had represented Mysore-Kodagu parliamentary seat as well.
A bitter critic of former Prime Minister H.D. Devegowda, Vishwanath later switched his loyalties to Janata Dal Secular headed by former prime minister H.D. Devegowda and he was made the State president of JDS State unit. In JDS, Vishwanath won Hunsur Assembly seat in Mysuru in 2018.
Vishwanath did not stay for long in JDS and he quit JDS to join BJP along with some rebel MLAs belonging to both JDS and Congress party which led to the collapse of JDS-Congress coalition government led by JDS leader and former Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy.
Joining BJP, Vishwanath lost the Hunsur Assembly seat to Congress nominee Manjunath. But, Vishwanath support to form BJP government in the State in 2019 did not go in vain and the BJP rewarded him with a MLC seat.
Now, sources said that Vishwanath is miffed at BJP as he was not made a minister while some of the other rebels such as Gopalaiah, K.C. Narayan Gowda, S.T. Somashekar and others, who joined the party with him have been made ministers, first in the government led by B.S. Yediyurappa and now Basavaraj Bommai.
If sources are to be believed, it was Vishwanath who brought Siddaramaiah to the Congress party in 2006 after Sidadramaiah was expelled from JDS by H.D. Devegowda. But, the relationship between Siddaramaiah and Vishwanath turned sour which made Vishwanath quit Congress party to join JDS.
Now, it is said that Vishwanath is all set to rejoin Congress party. Both Siddarmaiah and Vishwanath belong to Kuruba community and hail from Mysuru district.
However, there was no immediate reaction from either Siddaramaiah or Vishwanath on the meeting.
