Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Raut  denied any possibility of Shiv Sena allying with the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) claiming that the Asaduddin Owaisi-led party is in a secret alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

“Imtiaz Jaleel is an MP of AIMIM. I keep meeting him, that doesn’t mean we’re forming an alliance with them. We cannot imagine forming an alliance with AIMIM. Moreover, there is a secret alliance between AIMIM and BJP, you must have seen in the Uttar Pradesh polls,” the Shiv Sena leader told ANI.

His remarks came a day after AIMIM MP Imtiaz Jaleel said his party is willing to ally with NCP and Congress, which are constituents of the Shiv Sena-led Maha Vikas Aghadi government in Maharashtra, adding the Asaduddin Owaisi-led party is not the ‘B’ team of BJP as alleged by mainstream parties.

Jaleel said he spoke about the AIMIM’s willingness to tie up when state minister and NCP leader Rajesh Tope visited his residence on Friday.

“Tope visited me on Friday, days after lost my mother due to an illness. It is always alleged that Bharatiya Janata Party wins because of us (AIMIM- due to splitting of Muslim votes). To prove this allegation wrong I proposed to Tope that we are ready for an alliance. However, he didn’t say anything about my offer,” Jaleel, who heads the Maharashtra unit of AIMIM, said.

Meanwhile, former Maharashtra CM and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis also commented on the development and said that the Shiv Sena forming an alliance with AIMIM hardly matters to the saffron party.

“People vote for us because of PM Narendra Modi and the work we do. All these political parties are the same, even if all of them come together it won’t create any difference,” Fadnavis said.