After days of rancor over seat-sharing, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Thursday parted ways with its 25-year-old alliance partner Shiv Sena ahead of the Maharashtra legislative assembly elections, scheduled for October 15.

The BJP said though the party wanted to continue the tie-up, the Sena’s demands were not flexible.

Addressing the media in Mumbai on Thursday evening, Maharashtra BJP chief Devendra Fadanavis said talks over seat-sharing were going on for the last several days but the two parties could not arrive at anything concrete. “The Shiv Sena never showed enough flexibility in taking the grand alliance forward despite several compromises made by BJP,” he said.

“With time running out, we have decided to snap ties with our long-term partner and contest the assembly polls with smaller allies of the 'mahayuti' (grand alliance) to keep the Congress-NCP out of power in Maharashtra,”  Fadanavis said.

The BJP leader also said though talks on seat-sharing were always on, the options offered by Shiv Sena were not acceptable.

The split assumes significance as it comes just 25 days before the assembly elections to be held on October 15. 

Earlier, the two allies had, after several rounds of talks, agreed to the formula of 151 seats for Shiv Sena and 130 for the BJP. The remaining seven, out of the total 288 seats, were left for the smaller parties which include Swabhimani Shetkari Sangathan, Rashtriya Samaj Paksha, Republican Party of India (Athavale) and Shiv Sangram.

But the smaller parties in the alliance objected to the proposed formula, leading to the deadlock.