The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam is ideologically opposed to the Bharatiya Janata Party’s policies and will never ally with it, working president MK Stalin said during a rally in Madurai on Wednesday, The Hindu reported. The statement follows Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with DMK chief M Karunanidhi in the Tamil Nadu leader’s house in Chennai on Monday.

Hours after the visit, DMK announced it was participating in the rally and dismissed the PM’s visit as a “courtesy call”.

“Some sections of the media, to create confusion, said the DMK had joined hands with the BJP,” Stalin said at a “Black Day” demonstration organised by the Opposition to mark one year of demonetisation on Wednesday. “This will never happen.”

The BJP’s policies had doomed the economy and left thousands unemployed, The Hindu quoted Stalin as saying. “Demonetisation benefited only the friends of the BJP and not the masses, as claimed by the Centre,” he said.

At another rally in Coimbatore, DMK MP and Stalin’s sister Kanimozhi also hit out at the Centre, calling demonetisation a “cyclone that turned the life of the people upside down”.

Eighteen political parties, including the Congress, had said they would hold protests across the country on November 8 against the NDA government’s note ban, PTI reported.