Mangaluru : Former Prime Minister and JD(S) senior leader H D Deve Gowda and his wife Chennamma visited the Sri Kukke Subrahmanya temple on Monday morning and offered special prayers.

Deve Gowda and his wife were supposed to reach Kukke Subrahmanya by helicopter on Sunday afternoon, but the helicopter could not take off due to bad weather. Later, the couple came to Mangaluru by plane and reached Subrahmanya late at night on Sunday.

They visited Kukke Subrahmanya temple early today and offered special prayers.

Speaking after offering special puja at Kukke Subrahmanya Temple, the former prime minister said JD(S) legislative party leader H D Kumaraswamy has already held talks with Home Minister Amit Shah on the alliance. “After the Parliament session if my health condition improves, then myself or Kumaraswamy will hold talks with Shah once again”, he stated.

“Before the alliance, we held two rounds of talks with 19 MLAs and eight MLCs and JD(S) state president C M Ibrahim. After speaking to our leaders, then only Kumaraswamy met Amit Shah,” clarified Gowda. A decision on seat sharing among parties in the next Lok Sabha elections is reached based on vote share of the parties in the previous elections. The decision on the seat sharing including Mandya seat has not been taken yet,” he said.

“Congress wants to win all the constituencies. Hence, BJP-JD(S) took a decision to contest the election as an alliance,” he further added.

“I do not wish to argue on division of votes on the lines of castes. In the previous election, the vote share of the BJP was 33 per cent, Congress- 40 per cent and JD(S) – 22 per cent. The voters will decide on whom they want to elect,” said Deve Gowda.