Prashant Kishor making Muslims scapegoats for Mamata's failures: Owaisi

Hours after the BJP rejoiced over its “West Bengal victory” contained in purported remarks by Prashant Kishor in audio clips that emerged on Saturday (April 10), it was the turn of AIMIM’s Asaduddin Owaisi to hit out at the poll strategist over his purported claims about a culture of minority appeasement in the state.

The Federal could not independently confirm the veracity of the tapes.

Referring to audio tapes ostensibly held on Clubhouse app, Owaisi in a series of tweets alleged that Muslims of Bengal fared poorly on many parameters, including education and government jobs.

Tweeting four audio clips, BJP’s IT cell head Amit Malviya on Saturday claimed that “Mamata Banerjee’s election strategist concedes that even in TMC’s internal surveys, BJP is winning.”

In one of the clips, Kishor is also purportedly heard talking about the politics of “minority appeasement” in India over the past 20 years. In Bengal the Congress, the Left and the TMC have all worked to secure the Muslim vote, he purportedly said, adding that politics in Bengal is driven by the belief that whoever Muslims vote for wins.

Kishor has accused the BJP of picking select comments and distorting the context.

Also read: Secular parties deceived Muslims, did not encourage leadership: Owaisi

Owaisi, whose party is contesting seven seats in Bengal, said rather than “introspecting” on how Mamata allowed communalism to take root in the state, Kishor has chosen to make Muslims the “scapegoat” for her failures.

Owaisi said Muslims make 27 per cent of Bengal’s population but “have only 6% govt jobs”. “Only 11% of students in higher education are Muslims & 80% of rural Muslims earn less than ₹5k. 6 worst performing districts on healthcare have a Muslim population share of more than 25%,” he said.

| @MamataOfficial's celebrated poll strategist is speaking his fact-free mind here. Instead of introspecting on how she allowed majoritarian communalism to take root in Bengal, he chooses to scapegoat Muslims for her failures. Muslims are 27% of the state BUT… [1/n] pic.twitter.com/era7FUlMcN

— Asaduddin Owaisi (@asadowaisi) April 10, 2021

Owaisi also accuses the Left, which ruled Bengal for over 30 years before Mamata defeated them, of mistreating Muslims. “People in Malda, Murshidabad, etc have to drink arsenic contaminated water. These are fruits of ‘blatant appeasement’,” he said.

Owaisi also referred to the recent episode where Mamata Banerjee revealed her gotra. “Why does @MamataOfficial go everywhere to talk about her gotra in varna system? She told Muslims that she’ll protect them from Hindutva but her strategist is confessing how she let Hindutva grow. Allah protect us from such appeasement,” he said.

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