Muslims have experimented with everyone, will go with BJP now: Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi

Our candidates are not on the basis of caste or community. The idea is to ensure participation, political empowerment of all sections. We are in the arena on the promise of good governance and in that everyone is a stakeholder; whether they are upper caste, or backward, Dalit or Muslim is not a criteria. The Bihar elections are a fight between GDP and ABC — good governance, development and progress versus anarchy, bad governance and corruption. This unholy nexus of corruption and bad governance, which is represented by the Congress, Lalu Prasad and Nitish Kumar, cannot even choose a poll plank for themselves. They are attacking the central government, Modiji; it seems this is a Parliament election.

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By fighting the polls with Narendra Modi as its face and hard-selling central schemes, isn’t it the BJP that is making it a parliamentary election?

Narendra Modiji is our tallest leader… an icon of good governance and development, so naturally we will fight in his name unitedly. It is a different matter that the allies of the Congress are so embarrassed that they will not share each other’s stage.

Aren’t there problems among NDA allies too? There was high drama at the RSLP press conference, the LJP is unhappy…

NDA allies are intact and we will fight elections unitedly. Distribution of tickets is the phase when all this happened. That phase is over now, we are now in campaign phase where we will put up a united face.

With caste such an important issue, will the BJP take into account RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’s views on reservation?

The party has made it clear that there is no scope of tinkering with the existing criteria for reservation.

The Samajwadi Secular Front has declared Tariq Anwar its CM candidate. Is the BJP considering an a possible Muslim CM candidate?

The party has decided it will take a call on the candidate after the elections… There is no issue in the BJP about who the CM candidate is. We have fought elections in Jammu and Kashmir, Maharashtra, Jharkhand without a CM face, won them and had our own CMs. The same will happen in Bihar.

Will Asaduddin Owaisi’s party fighting 24 Seemanchal seats benefit the BJP?

Our stand is that this corrupt family of Lalu-Nitish and Congress contesting is what will benefit us the most. As for Owaisi or somebody else contesting, it is our firm belief that this time the Muslims of Bihar will go with the BJP. They have experimented with everyone. If they had to go with Owaisi or the new front or Lalu Prasad… let’s just say that the mood right now is to vote for BJP. Besides, during the Lok Sabha elections Muslims in Bihar voted for BJP in large numbers, and minorities, especially Muslims, had a major contribution in the NDA’s majority.

The BJP was part of the ruling alliance in Bihar for more than seven years. How can you escape responsibility for the bad governance you are accusing Nitish Kumar of?

Till we were in government, we were keeping things on a tight leash. We were ensuring there were no instances of corruption. Besides, we were just part of the government, we were not the government. But till we were there, there were no complaints against the government. But what they did after that showed what they were — they got Manjhi in, then threw him out, went and sat in Lalu’s lap, then went with the Congress.

Now that the BJP has gone from a beef ban to a meat ban, what are your views?

Beef ban or cow slaughter is a different issue, that I do not want to get into. Let me make it clear that a meat ban is not an agenda of the NDA government. We do not want such non-issues to derail our development agenda. You cannot forcibly stop anybody and I do not think it is our prerogative to enter people’s kitchens and decide what to eat or not to eat.

Will you ask your state governments to revoke their meat ban decisions?

India is a federal country. States have different considerations, regional issues, based on which decisions are taken. The central government cannot possibly meddle in those decisions.