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Azam among SP’s star campaigners, BJP targets oppn party
The 40-member list also has names of SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, Ram Gopal Yadav, Shivpal Yadav, Jaya Bachchan and Ramji Lal Suman among others
Samajwadi Party (SP)’s list of 40 star campaigners for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls has jailed SP leader Azam Khan’s name too. Azam Khan, SP’s Muslim poster boy and one of the founder members of the party, is in Sitapur jail.
The list also includes SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, party vice president Kiranmoy Nanda, chief national general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav, Rajya Sabha member Jaya Bachchan, Mainpuri MP Dimple Yadav, RS member Javed Ali Khan, state unit chief Naresh Uttam Patel, RS member Ramji Lal Suman, national general secretary Shivpal Yadav, several other Muslim leaders, heads of party’s various frontal organisations, several MLAs and a few MLCs.
Azam, his wife Tazeen Fatma and their son Abdullah Azam are in jail and cannot contest polls. The three were convicted in October 2023 for using a fake birth certificate of Abdullah Azam for the 2017 UP assembly polls. On Thursday, state BJP chief Bhupendra Chaudhary met the state chief electoral officer. Later talking to reporters, he attacked the SP for including Azam’s name in its list of star campaigners.
Chaudhary said the SP was a victim of infighting. “The public knows his (Azam Khan’s) character. Irfan Solanki can also be included in the list of star campaigners. This is the character of the Samajwadi Party and people of the state know everything.”
Targeting the Congress, he said the party had fled the state. Their leader Rahul Gandhi fled after losing the polls from Amethi in 2019. Their leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra also fled after the 2022 assembly elections, the BJP leader said.
“The Congress-SP alliance is an alliance of selfishness. The alliance of the people is with Modi ji and the BJP. We will win all 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh under the leadership of Modi ji and once again Modi government will be formed at the Centre,” Chaudhary said.
