Pictured: Former cleaner-turned-millionaire nightclub boss, 45, who is said to be the mother of Vladimir Putin's 17-year-old lovechild

Vladimir Putin has a secret love child with a former cleaner, it was claimed yesterday.

The Russian leader is said to have had an affair with Svetlana Krivonogikh and fathered Elizaveta, 17, during his first term as president.

His former mistress, 45, is now a multi-millionaire who owns a nightclub famed for erotic shows, news site Project reported.

Vladimir Putin reportedly has a secret teenager daughter with cleaner-turned-millionaire Svetlana Krivonogikh, who he reportedly had an affair with starting in the late Nineties

It is alleged Putin had the affair during his first term as Russian president in the 1990s

The Russian leader is said to have had an affair with Svetlana Krivonogikh and fathered Elizaveta, 17, during his first term as president

It said Elizaveta’s middle name is Vladimirovna – indicating her father’s name is Vladimir.

But there is apparently no name for him on the birth certificate. Pictures of the teenager’s face have not been published.

But Project reported facial recognition expert Hassan Ugail, of the University of Bradford, concluded she ‘bears a phenomenal resemblance to the Russian president’.

Software allegedly showed a 70.44 per cent similarity with Putin.

Miss Krivonogikh is said to have worked as a cleaner in a shop as a teenager before going to university.

She would accompany Mr Putin, pictured, on journeys in the late 1990s when she was in her 20s. The economics graduate is now said to have £8million of shares in Bank Rossiya, having suddenly come into money in 2000.

Putin is thought to have two daughters by his ex-wife, including dancer-turned-political appointee Katerina Tikhonova

Miss Krivonogikh also owns the Leningrad Centre club and is said to be worth as much as £75million.

Former neighbours at her flat in St Petersburg said she had a secret wealthy benefactor referred to as ‘Daddy’. Afterwards she and her mother quickly moved to an upmarket property in the city.

Love child Elizaveta was born in 2003, it was claimed.

The relationship supposedly ended around the time Putin began to be linked to Olympic gold-winning gymnast Alina Kabaeva, now 37 and head of a pro-Kremlin media company.

Mr Putin, 68, has two daughters Maria, 35, and Katerina, 34, from his marriage to Lyudmila Putina. The couple divorced in 2013.

Questioned about the relationship with Miss Krivonogikh, Mr Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: ‘I’ve been asked about this last name. But I’ve never heard anything about it and I don’t know anything.’

The president’s personal life has recently become a target of independent and opposition media, who are growing in bravery in taking on the long-standing leader.

He was recently reported to have numerous medical problems and his family have apparently asked him to stand down next year.

Miss Krivonogikh and her daughter are understood to have removed their social media pages following publication of the claims.

She is known to be close to Mr Putin’s longtime oligarch friend Yury Kovalchuk, the biggest shareholder in Bank Rossiya. The bank was sanctioned by the West after Russia’s 2014 military annexation of Crimea.

Project said it had contacted Miss Krivonogihk but she was unable to speak because she was on a train.

‘She promised to call back but never did,’ it reported.

It was unable to contact her further.

Doctor Maria Vorontsova is thought to be Putin's second daughter by his ex-wife, though he has never publicly acknowledged either of the women