No Alliance With Prakash Ambedkar's Party, Says Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM

Asaduddin Owaisi's party AIMIM today called off talks with Prakash Ambedkar's Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi after it was offered just eight seats for the Maharashtra Assembly election.

Prakash Ambedkar's party however said it was unaware of any such development and claimed that the alliance still exists.

AIMIM's Maharashtra unit chief Imtiyaz Jaleel, in a statement, said the two parties could not reach a "comfortable and respectable figure" of seat distribution despite two month-long talks.

"This is simply unacceptable and unjustified as the list does not include Aurangabad Central seat," he said.

"Our party leader Gaffar Qadri had a series of meetings with Prakash Ambedkar, the last one on September 5 in Pune. He was told about the decision then. Balasaheb has sent an email to AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi that he would give our party eight seats, Mr Jaleel said.

"Irrespective of our alliance not taking place, we are committed and will continue to take up issues of the oppressed classes from the weaker sections of the society," he added.

Prakash Ambedkar's party said. "We haven't got any communication from Asaduddin Owaisi regarding calling off the alliance. Hence, we consider that the VBA-AIMIM alliance exists."

The VBA-AIMIM had managed to hurt the Congress-NCP in several seats in the Lok Sabha polls, prompting the opposition combine to call the former the "B team" of the ruling BJP-Shiv Sena.