Having found itself on the defensive over a “secret” two-hour-long meeting between its leader Sanjay Raut and senior BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis at Mumbai hotel on Saturday, the Shiv Sena on Monday said that Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray had known about the meeting between Raut and Fadnavis and that there was no need for people to draw all kinds of inferences into the meeting.
Sena’s senior leader and state party minister Anil Parab came out with a clarification to this effect, a day after Raut had himself said that he had met the BJP leader to discuss certain issues. Raut had said that there might be ideological differences between Shiv Sena and BJP but the leaders of the two parties were not enemies of each other.
A day after his meeting with Fadnavis, Raut had said: “Yes. I had met Fadnavis to discuss certain issues. He is a former CM and Leader of Opposition in Maharashtra and also the BJP in-charge for Bihar polls. There may be ideological differences between the two parties, but we are not enemies. There are no personal disputes to settle. Meetings do keep taking place between the ruling and Opposition sides. When we were in power with the BJP, I used to meet Pawar saheb”.
On his part, Fadnavis had said it was wrong to attribute political meaning to the meeting. He said that the BJP had no plans to align with the Shiv Sena to return to power in Maharashtra. “Don’t attribute political meaning to this meeting. We are not in a hurry to return to power in Maharashtra. The BJP has established itself as an aggressive Opposition party. We are taking up the issues of the people effectively,” Fadnavis said.
Earlier, Raut – who is the executive editor of the Shiv Srena’s official mouth-piece”Saamana” -- had clarified that he had met Fadnavis for a newspaper interview,