Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Saturday visited Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam chief M Karunanidhi at a hospital in Chennai, where the former Tamil Nadu chief minister was admitted late on Thursday, ANI reported. Gandhi was accompanied by senior state and central Congress leaders, including former Union minister P Chidambaram and Tamil Nadu Congress Committee president Su Thirunavukarasar.

Gandhi told reporters he was “happy to see” that Karunanidhi was doing well. “Doctors told me he will be able to go home soon,” he said. “He is [a] leader of [the] Tamil people. I met him and said hello.” The Congress leader added that he had also conveyed party president Sonia Gandhi’s regards to Karunanidhi as well. The former state chief minister was first admitted to the hospital on December 1 for nutritional treatment and hydration. He was discharged on December 7.

While the DMK chief has not been seen in public since developing a drug-related allergy in October, the party on December 10 said he would chair its general council meeting, where his son, MK Stalin, is expected to made working president. News of his admission and treatment comes even as the state mourns the death of former state chief minister and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader J Jayalalithaa.