Owaisi slams minister’s bullet rant

AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi on Tuesday hit out at minister of state for finance Anurag Thakur for the latter’s controversial slogan ‘Desh ke gaddaron ko goli maro saalon ko’ hinting at him and Imtiyaz Jaleel, and challenged the BJP leader to specify the place where he would want to shoot him.

Addressing a public meeting in Mumbai, Mr Owaisi asked Mr Thakur how many people he will shoot. “I knew who were traitors in your eyes. In your eyes Mr Asaduddin Owaisi and Mr Imtiyaz Jaleel are traitors. Let me tell you that your government will run out of bullets, but not our numbers.”

Mr Owaisi said, “Shoot us if you want to. I challenge you Anurag Thakur, identify a place in the Bharat, I am ready to come there. Shoot on my chest, I want to see. I want to try my invocations. If there is death written by Allah, I will die, but remember that your statements can’t create fear in my heart because our mothers and sisters have come out in large numbers on the roads. They have decided to save the country.”

Mr Owaisi urged Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray to convene a special Assembly session and declare that the CAA, NRC and the NPR would not be implemented in the state. He said there were many poor people, including Adivasis who do not have the birth certificates. According to the National Health Survey report of 2015, 28 per cent of Indians do not have birth certificates.

Recalling Muslim leaders, Mr Owaisi said, “Right here in Mumbai, there was Jinnah, who went to Pakistan, and there Yousuf Meher Ali, who participated in the Quit India movement. Like Meher Ali we now need to raise the slogans of ‘Quit BJP, Quit Modi and Quit Amit Shah’.”