New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday met party president Mallikarjun Kharge ahead of the crucial deliberations to decide Karnataka's new chief minister.
Gandhi drove to Kharge's residence and held a closed-door meeting with the Congress chief. Congress General Secretary Randeep Surjewala, who is in charge of the party's affairs in Karnataka, was also present at the meeting.
Kharge has held discussions with party leaders from Karnataka and the three observers appointed by him to oversee the Congress Legislature Party meeting in Bengaluru on Sunday.
On Monday night, party sources had said that the Congress chief will decide on the next CM of Karnataka after discussing the result of the secret ballot voting with UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.
Sonia Gandhi is currently in Himachal Pradesh's Shimla.
Both Siddaramaiah and state Congress president D K Shivakumar are front runners for the chief minister's post and both are lobbying for it.
While former chief minister Siddaramaiah reached Delhi on Monday, Shivakumar arrived in the national capital Tuesday afternoon. After arriving at Delhi airport, he did not speak to the media and walked away with folded hands parrying a barrage of questions from reporters.
"I have done my duty... Congress party is our mother, temple, everything. My General Secretary said -- DK -- (D K Shivakumar) you come alone. I'm going alone," the Karnataka party unit chief said ahead of the Delhi visit.
In just-concluded Assembly elections, the Congress scored an emphatic victory with 135 seats while the ruling BJP and the former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda-led Janata Dal (Secular) secured 66 and 19 seats, respectively.
(With PTI inputs.)
