Mumbai | Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Thursday downplayed the meeting between MNS president Raj Thackeray and CM Devendra Fadnavis, saying that maintaining communication is a tradition in the state.

Talking to reporters in Wardha, Pawar said, “Many leaders meet one another as well as with the chief minister, irrespective of whether they are in power or not. Maintaining communication with each other is the tradition of the state. There is no need to give a political angle to this meeting.” Earlier, Raj Thackeray met Fadnavis at the latter's official bungalow ‘Varsha' in south Mumbai, prompting speculation in the state's political circles.

The meeting came after the first joint contest by the Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena (UBT) and Raj Thackeray's Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) in the BEST Employees' Co-operative Credit Society elections ended in a humiliating defeat on Wednesday. The two parties' joint panel failed to win any of the 21 seats in the polls.

Fadnavis had on Wednesday accused the two parties of politicising the credit society polls around the “Thackeray brand”.

There have been talks of a possible alliance between the Sena (UBT) and the MNS for the forthcoming local body polls in the state, particularly after the Thackeray cousins shared a political stage last month on the issue of Marathi identity and “imposition” of the Hindi language in the state