In Telangana, the BJP is nowhere says Owaisi

Hyderabad, July 25: BJP will not be able to gain strength in Telangana and make a mark, though the party is hopeful about it, AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi claimed.

"In Andhra Pradesh, nobody is ready to hold BJP's flag. Nothing is going to happen in Telangana (in favour of BJP).

In Telangana, people have seen the governance of TRS in the last four years and our work. They (BJP) are nowhere," he told reporters here.

MIM has been friendly with the ruling TRS in Telangana. Owaisi was asked about BJP favouring contesting the 2019 elections on its own in the state.

BJP President Amit Shah visited the city yesterday and held meetings with the Telangana unit leaders to gear up the party for the simultaneous Lok Sabha and Legislative Assembly polls next year.

Asked about the comments of former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti that any attempt to create a split in PDP will have dangerous consequences, Owaisi said the PDP was till recently an ally of the BJP.

"Mehbooba Mufti walked hand in hand with these (BJP) all these years. She did not remember then. Why she is remembering now?," he said.

Claiming that the situation had deteriorated in Jammu and Kashmir during PDP-BJP regime with many children turning blind (in anti-militancy operations) and Army camps attacked, Owaisi alleged that BJP and PDP were responsible for it.

"The government has gone now. You are talking these things. The whole responsibility lies with Mehbooba Mufti, BJP... Both are responsible," Owaisi said.

Asked about Prime Minister Narendra Modi conducting rallies in Uttar Pradesh, he claimed that it shows the declining graph of BJP in the state.

"I wish the Prime Minister would have inquired how is that in a jail, inside a jail, an undertrial was shot dead? I wish the Prime Minister inquired what is happening in Uttar Pradesh. Misgovernance is happening over there," he said.

The rallies by the PM showed that BJP was realising that the party was losing ground in UP, he claimed.