‘Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party and Congress tie-up will stop division of Muslim votes’

AGRA: End of family feud in the Samajwadi Party (SP) and its likely alliance with Congress is giving a lot of confidence to Muslim voters, say influential community leaders, many of them in west UP which has a substantial Muslim population. The religious leaders add that Muslim votes will not be divided now as there is clarity in the community about who they are going to vote for.
Maintaining that they see formation of a “secular” government in the SP-Congress collaboration, the leaders said there is still some mistrust in the community for the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which had tied up in the past with BJP. However, a little of that will be offset with BSP giving 97 seats this time to Muslims.
Mufti Mohammed Saleem Noori, the spokesperson of Bareilly’s Dargah Aala Hazrat which enjoys considerable influence among Muslims in the region, said, “Muslims are troubled by communal forces and want politics in the name of development. With Akhilesh Yadav coming out stronger from the family feud, he has become our first choice. Youths are attracted towards his talks of development, education and employment. Earlier, when the feud between two factions of the Samajwadi Party was going on in full swing, the community was in two minds and even thought for a while of shifting our loyalty towards BSP, but there is clarity now. Akhilesh-led SP is the choice of all Muslims.”
Sami Agai, national president of Bharatiya Muslim Vikas Parishad, said, “Muslims have always supported political parties which talk about fighting against communal forces. At present, when Congress is weak and there are serious doubts about BSP’s trustworthiness, the community has no choice but to vote for the Samajwadi Party. Moreover, chief minister Akhilesh Yadav has built an image of a pro-development leader. This has sent a positive message in the community, especially among youths, and we want to give him a second chance.”
Meerut sheher qazi Zainus Sajidin said the community is with Akhilesh Yadav. “He has done good work in his first tenure without playing the caste or religion card. He is young and dynamic and collaboration with another young leader like Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi will be good for the community as well as the state.”
Mohammad Sharif Qureshi, Agra district president of All India Jamiatul Quresh, said, “A meeting of community members was held here 15 days ago in the city, where we decided that we would not talk about not giving vote to BJP as it leads to polarization of votes. We also decided that we would not vote for any party which talks about caste or religion. With a likely alliance of Congress and Samajwadi Party, we have no confusion who to vote for. We hope the alliance forms the government in the state.”
Notably, just a fortnight ago, Syed Ahmad Bukhari, Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid, had said that time has come for Muslims to look beyond SP. In view of the bitter family feud in the party, Bukhari had said, "Muslims should teach the warring factions within SP a lesson in the upcoming Assembly polls for cheating them. The community should look for an option and not let the leaders take them for granted."