Bengaluru: YSR Telangana Party (YSRTP) president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Jagan Mohan Reddy's sister Sharmila met Karnataka deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar in Bengaluru today.
Sharmila, who termed her visit to be a courtesy call met Shivakumar at his Sadashivnagar residence in Bengaluru and held talks there. This was Sharmila's first meeting with the deputy chief minister after the latter assumed office. She had earlier congratulated Shivakumar after the Karnataka assembly election results were announced and also wished him on his birthday.
While congratulating Shivakumar for the landslide victory in Karnataka, Sharmila had said that her family shared close ties with him. She said that Shivakumar was a close friend of her father, former chief minister later YS Rajasekhar Reddy.
Today's meeting assumes significance amid speculations of an alliance between YSRTP and Congress in Telangana that will go for polls in the end of this year. Earlier, while responding to the rumours of alliance, Sharmila had said that their sole aim was to ensure that Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekhar Rao's party is not re-elected and for which they were ready to talk with any party. She also said that since it was an election year all parties would do their bid.
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The meeting has come soon after portfolios were allotted to ministers in Karnataka. Chief minister Siddaramaiah kept finance while Shivakumar was given major, medium irrigation and Bengaluru city development departments.
Among the other departments that are held by Siddaramaiah include cabinet affairs, personnel and administrative reforms, intelligence, information, IT and BT infrastructure development and all unallocated portfolios.
