With Khan as a major element in SP’s PDA (Pichra, Dalit, Alpashankhyak) vote bank politics, the party leadership would have to make well-meaning efforts to keep him in good humour as there are reports in political circle about “Khan not happy with SP leadership”, writes M Hasan
Lucknow, September 23: After nearly 23 months of incarceration and long drawn legal battle senior Samajwadi Party leader and prominent Muslim face in Uttar Pradesh’s highly caste-ridden politics Mohammad Azam Khan was freed from Sitapur Jail today (September 23).
The freedom from jail was possible after Khan’s legal team succeeded in getting bails in multiple cases against him, which the SP leaders had dubbed as result of “political vendetta” against Khan. Significantly the BJP government had made last ditch-effort to keep him imprisoned by slapping some more charges in a case in which the High Court had few days back bailed in him out. While his son Adeeb received his father outside the jail, large number of Khan’s supporters had also gathered to welcome him. Immediately after his release Khan left for his hometown Rampur.
In view of his imprisonment, Khan was completely cut off from politically activities, including his absence in 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Khan has come out of jail at a time when the Samajwadi Party led by Akhilesh Yadav has been making desperate efforts to regain lost ground after 2022 assembly election. With Khan as a major element in SP’s PDA (Pichra, Dalit, Alpashankhyak) vote bank politics, the party leadership would have to make well-meaning efforts to keep him in good humour as there are reports in political circle about “Khan not happy with SP leadership”. The leadership has also been accused of “ignoring” Khan during his jail term. It is despite the fact that some SP leaders had been assigned the task to constantly be in touch with him jail. When Khan suffered massive bout of corona virus during pandemic and his condition had deteriorated, Mulayam Singh Yadav had reportedly played crucial role in Khan’s shifting from jail to Medanta hospital in Lucknow in July 2021.
However, it would be watched with interest the next course of political action Khan undertakes. Will Khan would like to stay in SP, which he had found with Mulayam Singh Yadav and other senior leaders, or chalk out a separate course is being hotly debated in the political circle. He was at loggerheads with SP leadership in the selection of party candidate for Lok Sabha election in 2024 from Rampur, where the party had fielded Mohibbullah Nadvi, who won the election.
There is no doubt that Khan is a popular Muslim face who had played crucial role in party’s unprecedented electoral victory in 2012 and subsequently installation of Akhilesh Yadav as the Chief Minister. Nothing moved on “Muslim issues” during Akhilesh Yadav government without Khan’s clearance. This had reportedly annoyed some Muslim clerics who wanted to have direct proximity with the Chief Minister. Even though a group of clerics still have reservation about him, Khan’s long imprisonment and BJP government’s action against his dream project Maulana Mohd Ali Jauhar University Rampur has led to a “Sympathy” with him. Thus the possibility of Rampur-Morababad turning into battle ground for “Muslim politics” cannot be ruled out. Though neither Khan nor his son Abdullah Azam Khan would be able to contest 2027 assembly case because of the pending criminal cases, he would certainly push his tested loyalists to take charge. Thus with Muslim undercurrent in his favour, the SP leadership would have to chalk action plan carefully as it was done in case of Shivpal Yadav when he split away from the party but was brought back with deft handling of Mulayam Singh Yadav. The possibility of bickering with Khan within the party cannot be ruled out. But in the absence of established Muslim leadership in UP, Khan becoming “A” of Akhilesh Yadav’s PDA is undisputed reality. Large number of Muslim clerics (both Sunni and Shias), who have long been hankering to grab political space have already been hobnobbing with the BJP.
(M Hasan is former Chief of Bureau, Hindustan Times Lucknow)
