When img1 has shape (M,N,3) or (M,N,4), the values in img1 are interpreted as RGB or RGBA values. In this case the cmap is ignored. Per the help(plt.imshow) docstring:

cmap : ~matplotlib.colors.Colormap, optional, default: None

If None, default to rc image.cmap value. cmap is ignored when X has RGB(A) information

However, if img were an array of shape (M,N), then the cmap controls the colormap used to display the values.

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import mpl_toolkits.axes_grid1 as axes_grid1
np.random.seed(1)

data = np.random.randn(10, 10)

fig = plt.figure()
grid = axes_grid1.AxesGrid(
    fig, 111, nrows_ncols=(1, 2), axes_pad = 0.5, cbar_location = "right",
    cbar_mode="each", cbar_size="15%", cbar_pad="5%",)

im0 = grid[0].imshow(data, cmap='gray', interpolation='nearest')
grid.cbar_axes[0].colorbar(im0)

im1 = grid[1].imshow(data, cmap='jet', interpolation='nearest')
grid.cbar_axes[1].colorbar(im1)
plt.savefig('/tmp/test.png', bbox_inches='tight', pad_inches=0.0, dpi=200,)