‘Muslims harassed in UP’: Owaisi slams BJP
LUCKNOW: All India Majlis-e-ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Tuesday said his party’s main aim was to ensure the defeat of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections, even as he attacked successive governments led by the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) for the poor plight of Muslims in the state.
Launching the party’s poll campaign at Rudauli town in Ayodhya district on Tuesday, Owaisi said the AIMIM was ready to discuss pre-poll alliance with the SP or BSP, but the talk will be over the share of the Muslim community if the alliance came to the power in Uttar Pradesh. “Muslims constitute 19% population of UP whereas Yadav community leader becomes CM though they are mere 9% of the population. The Muslims are denied government jobs.”
Restricted to Hyderabad in Telangana for much of its 93-year-old existence , the party has, in recent years, expanded to Maharashtra and Bihar. It also tried to expand to West Bengal where it could not make a dent in this year’s assembly elections.
“The Muslims in UP are harassed and exploited. They have been denied a share in the power, education and basic facilities. They have been denied justice...,” he added
The ruling BJP, however, hit back at Owaisi. “Yogi Ji will not allow Jinnah’s jehadi mentality to flourish in UP,” BJP’S Kannauj MP Subrat Pathak said in a tweet in Hindi.