AIMIM OFFERS PARTY TICKET TO MUKHTAR ANSARI

LUCKNOW: The All India Majlise-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) led by Asaduddin Owaisi on Friday offered jailed gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari the party ticket from Mau in eastern Uttar Pradesh for the 2022 state assembly election, hours after Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati announced that the BSP will not renominate Ansari, the sitting MLA from Mau.

AIMIM’s Uttar Pradesh unit president Shaukat Ali also said the party was ready to welcome jailed Samajwadi Party MP Azam Khan into the party fold. Khan represents Rampur in the Lok Sabha.

Khan’s supporters were in contact with the AIMIM leadership, he said. He alleged the BSP and the Samajwadi Party (SP) used Muslim leaders and voters for political gains and later dumped them.

AIMIM national spokesperson Syed Asim Waqar said the party’s doors were open for Ansari. “If Ansari wants to contest the election, the doors of AIMIM are open for him. We will give him a ticket and ensure his victory also,” he said to the news agency PTI.

For his part, Shaukat Ali said Mukhtar Ansari, facing trial in criminal cases, is in jail but has not been convicted by court yet. According to the Election Commission of India rules, he can contest elections.

The BSP used Mukhtar Ansari’s clout to make inroads among Muslim voters and gave the party ticket to him as well as his family members in the 2017 assembly election and the 2019 Lok Sabha polls even though he was facing charges in criminal cases, the AIMIM state president said. Now when the BSP’s agenda has been served Mayawati is saying that Mukhtar is a mafia, he said.

The same was true of former Lok Sabha MP Atiq Ahmed, who joined the AIMIM on Tuesday, Ali said. Ahmed won the 2004 Lok Sabha election as an SP candidate from Phulpur in Uttar Pradesh. The SP used his influence to widen its support base in the Prayagraj region and later showed him the door, Shaukat Ali said.

Muslims should realise the duplicity in the words and actions of the SP and BSP leaders, he stated. Ali also said BSP MP from Ghosi Atul Rai was charged under section 376 IPC (rape) and the allegedly victim committed self-immolation but Rai continues to be a BSP member, he said. AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi will address public meetings in Sambhal on September 22, Prayagraj on September 25, Kanpur on September 26 and Bahraich on September 30, he said.