Kolkata
Speaking at a press conference held in the Dum Dum area on the northern outskirts of Kolkata, Owaisi responded sharply to the accusations leveled by the Trinamool Congress leadership.
The ruling party in West Bengal had alleged that the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen was being funded by the Bharatiya Janata Party to split minority votes and indirectly benefit the saffron camp in the forthcoming two-phase Assembly elections.
Owaisi ridiculed the allegation and used sarcasm to counter the claim. He remarked that if such accusations were true, he would be willing to hand over ninety percent of the alleged funds to Trinamool Congress general secretary Abhishek Banerjee. He added that he would retain only five percent for himself and give the remaining five percent to his associate Humayun Kabir. Kabir, who was also present at the press conference, recently formed his own political outfit after being suspended from the Trinamool Congress.
The AIMIM has entered into a seat-sharing arrangement with Kabir’s newly formed party for the West Bengal Assembly elections. Both parties are focusing their campaigns primarily on constituencies with a significant minority population, aiming to establish a political presence in the state.
Rejecting the funding allegations outright, Owaisi questioned the logic behind the claims. He pointed out that the Bharatiya Janata Party’s rise in West Bengal, from securing only three seats in the 2016 Assembly elections to winning seventy-seven seats in 2021, could not be attributed to his party. He further questioned whether AIMIM had played any role in the growth of the BJP’s parliamentary strength. Owaisi concluded by asserting that such allegations were an attempt to deflect attention from real political issues and to undermine emerging political alternatives in the state.