Bengaluru: Former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is taking a 10-day break with his son and friends in Europe beginning September 2.
According to his close aides, besides his son and MLA, Dr Yatindra Mr Siddaramaiah will be joined by Minister K J George and Congress MLA, H K Patil. His wife, Parvathi, is going on a foreign vacation with her relatives during the same time.
Speaking to the Deccan Chronicle, Dr Yatindra revealed he would accompany his father to Frankfurt, Moscow, London, Scotland and Paris. " I am excited. I have visited many countries with my friends but this is my first trip with my dad," he said, adding his father was so busy with politics that he had hardly gone on vacation. As Chief Minister he has visited several countries on official tour, but not gone on holiday.
Two years ago, Mr Siddaramaiah and his wife went to Belgium to bring back the body of their elder son, Rakesh, who passed away suddenly there. Later, occupied with state politics and the Assembly polls, the former Chief Minister hardly took time off, preferring to go on a month-long tour of Karnataka to campaign for his party and accompany Congress president, Rahul Gandhi during his rallies across the state.
But now his family has persuaded him to take a small break abroad and Mr Siddaramaiah has agreed to spend 10 days in Europe with his son and political friends , according to sources.
"He is not very fond of going abroad. He prefers to spend time with his school mates at the Siddaramaiyanna Hundi village on the outskirts of Mysuru or discuss politics with the villagers. We don't know how he agreed to be out of Karnataka for ten days," said those close to him.
