Author: Praveen Patil
Publication: Niticentral.com
Date: September 18, 2013
URL: http://www.niticentral.com/2013/09/18/spiteful-azam-khan-and-why-hes-loved-by-sp-emulated-by-congress-134500.html

Only one Muslim Minister (Azad) is present in the (Union) Cabinet, and that too not from India, but Kashmir. That Kashmir, which is still controversial, and we don’t know whether it is part of India or not…” this was one of the quotable quotes from Azam Khan in a public rally in Uttar Pradesh, as recently as 2010-11. This statement gives a glimpse into the psyche of the ‘Muslim face’ of Samajwadi party. In western UP, for many years now, Azam Khan has been referred to as ‘AK-47′ as an acronym not only for his firebrand leadership but also as a snide to his alleged links with arms smugglers who operate across the Nepal border.

In the past there have been various allegations at different levels about Khan’s links to the Pakistani intelligence agency, the ISI. Apart from rumours and ‘source’-based newspaper reports, there has been at least one major book written by a former RAW spy master, MK Dhar, which hints at such links of Khan and 11 other legislators “of a central northern State”. In fact, in August 2006, there was a heated debate in the UP Assembly when the then Opposition leader, Lalji Tandon, raised the issue of these links of ISI with the then UP Government headed by the Samjawadi Party.

This same Azam Khan was deliberately anointed as the Minister-in-Charge of the Maha Kumbh of 2013 – an exclusively Hindu religious event. Khan was busy throughout the mela in creating political divide among the Sadhus and belittling the VHP and BJP. Right from allocating prominent tents to allowing Sadhu processions to the ghat, Khan’s political hand was more than visible every day. As a result more than 50 per cent of the Akharas departed from the Kumbh village in dismay, at least a fortnight in advance. After Maghi Purnima on February 25, almost all the tents were empty and nobody stayed back for the last shahi snan on March 10 – of Shivratri. Such was the contempt of Khan towards the Kumbh, that he was found woefully short in arrangements for Mauni Amavasya on February 10, which resulted in the loss of 36 innocent lives in a stampede at Allahabad railway station where the dead bodies and injured were lying for hours after the incident with no help from the administration.

It is hardly surprising, therefore, that Azam Khan’s name should crop up prominently in the sting operations conducted by the TV Today group on Muzaffarnagar riots. It is also not surprising that Azam Khan forced the State police force not to act against Muslim rioters and let them “give vent to their anger”. What is also not surprising is the apathy of the Delhi news media which is hell-bent on maintaining its ideological positioning of “militant Hindu rioters versus innocent Muslim victims” narrative. There is a cozy symbiotic relationship here; Delhi’s editorial elite shall pontificate on the vagaries of ‘militant Hindutva’ and the secular political class shall pander to the minority vote-bank. Together they have only one target – to keep Narendra Modi outside the gates of Delhi. Thus, despite all the Azam Khan shenanigans, we shall continue to remain busy debating Jat belligerence, alleged fake video uploads by BJP leaders, and non-existent hate speeches by BJP MLAs.

What is surprising is the blatant communalisation of the institution of the Prime Minister. It is now well known that Manmohan Singh is a spineless Gandhi family sycophant and it does not matter if the Gandhis want to pander to the Muslim voters, for perhaps it is their political right. But Manmohan Singh, who once famously said that minorities have the first right to resources in India, has now evolved to such an extent that pain and sorrow of riots also have now been reserved only for the Muslims. Jats have been reduced to zombie status by the Prime Minister of India.