Shiv Sena-BJP will never fight polls separately, says Sanjay Raut

Shiv Sena Member of Parliament (MP) Sanjay Raut today denied news of a spit between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Shiv Sena.

"We will not fight the polls alone. Our alliance exists for the past 25 years, and will continue in the future also. There is no dispute, it's only in the media, but when we sit together, there is no dispute," said Raut.

He also said that he is not shocked over the split between the Congress and National Conference (NC) because the former has become and untouchable party and nobody is ready to sit with it in the parliament.

"Nobody is ready to sit with the Congress in Lok Sabha, neither TMC nor AIDMK. In a way the Congress has been separated from the nation's politics, they have become untouchable. We are not shocked to hear about congress-NC (National Conference) split. There are many states where congress doesn't even exist and it will slowly become useless wherever it still exists," said Raut

Raut added that there is a possibility that the alliance between Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) in Maharashtra can also break.

"In Maharashtra, the Congress-NCP alliance was made for the power but now there are no chances of them coming into power. So in our state also the Congress and NCP alliance can break. Many of NCP politicians have joined Shiv Sena and many will join BJP also," Raut added.

Yesterday, the Congress party decided to contest Jammu and Kashmir state polls alone, announced leader Ambika Soni, thus ending its six-year old alliance with National Conference (NC).

National Conference leader Omar Abdullah heads a coalition government in Jammu and Kashmir with the Congress party. The polls are due later this year.

Soni said the party would put up candidates in all 87 seats.

Senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad said party would seek people's mandate on development and secularism.