'India would have had a Shiv Sena PM if...': Sanjay Raut backs Uddhav's Hindutva remark

Mumbai, Jan 24: Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut on Monday took a dig at the Bharatiya Janata Party saying that the country could have seen a prime minister from his party had they not left contesting from North India for the BJP.

"We took BJP from bottom to top in Maharashtra. After Babri, there was a Shiv Sena wave in Northern India, if we had fought polls at that time, there would have been our (Shiv Sena) PM in country but we left it for them," news agency ANI quoted him as saying.

"BJP only uses Hindutva for power," Raut said.

Sanjay Raut's statement comes amid a war of words between the Shiv Sena and BJP after Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray targetted BJP over its "politically-convenient" Hindutva.

Former Maharashtra Chief Minister and BJP leader Devendra Fadnavis slammed Shiv Sena, saying that the latter has become "number four" party in the state.

"I want to remind them that their party (Shiv Sena) was not born at a time when BJP corporator was there in Mumbai. Till the time they were with us, they used to be number 1 or no 2 party but now they are at number 4," Fadnavis said.

"Where were you in the Ram Janmabhoomi campaign? We took the bullets and the lathis. Today the Ram temple is being built at Ayodhya under the leadership of PM Modi," Fadnavis said.

Uddhav said that he still believes that 25 years the Sena had spent with BJP as an ally were "rotted".

The Sena will try to expand its footprint outside Maharashtra and aim for a national role, he added.

He said the Sena had aligned with BJP for taking forward the agenda of Hindutva through power.