DK Shivakumar is the Congress' Karnataka chief
Viral images of actor Kichha Sudeep with Congress leader DK Shivakumar has driven speculation that the actor may join politics ahead of the Karnataka election later this year.
DK Shivakumar, the Congress' Karnataka chief, visited the Kannada actor at his home in Bengaluru. Photos of the meeting have been widely shared.
Whether they discussed a political debut for Kiccha Sudeep has not been confirmed by the actor or DK Shivakumar, who has been campaigning for the Karnataka polls.
The Congress has also not commented, though sources tell NDTV it may have just been a courtesy call by Mr Shivakumar.
The Congress leader likely invited Kiccha Sudeep to be a star campaigner, sources said.
The party is making an aggressive bid to regain power in Karnataka after its coalition government with the Janata Dal Secular collapsed in a BJP coup in 2019.
Kiccha Sudeep is one of the most popular actors in the Kannada film industry. He started acting in films in 1997.
The Kannada superstar made headlines last year as he sparred on social media with Bollywood actor Ajay Devgn, who said Hindi is India's national language.
In August, the actor's move to correct a journalist's pronunciation of "Kannada" sparked a debate.
"You pronounce Tamil correctly, Telugu correctly, but when it comes to Kannada, you say Kannad. You call it Hindi, not Hind, the same way, it's Kannada, not Kannad," Kiccha Sudeep told the journalist.