UP CM framing Azam Khan in false cases: SP leader Ram Govind Chaudhary

Ballia, July 17: Senior Samajwadi Party leader Ram Govind Chaudhary has accused Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath of implicating SP MP Azam Khan in fake cases and said his party would fight against this harassment.

"Yogi Adityanath is personally taking interest in inciting people to lodge fake cases against Azam Khan out of political vendetta," the SP leader Chaudhary said Tuesday night.

"Samajwadi Party will raise this issue of harassment of its senior leader in the Vidhan Sabha and also come on the road against it," said Chaudhary, also the Leader of Opposition. The charge of land grabbing against Khan is fake as the university about which it is being levelled is 16 years old and no one had raised it till now.

Chaudhary alleged Muslims and Yadavs were being targeted in the state as per a plan. SP chief Akhilesh Yadav has already constituted a 21-member committee, led by leader of opposition in the Legislative Council Ahmad Hasan, to probe "fake cases" lodged against party MP Azam Khan in Rampur. "The 21-member committee of party legislators led by the leader of opposition in legislative council will reach Rampur on July 20 and probe fake cases pertaining to the encroachment of land of farmers against Khan, who is also the vice-chancellor of Mohammad Ali Jauhar University," said SP chief spokesman Rajendra Chowdhury.

The committee will also probe into incidents of harassment to Khan by the district administration and submit its report to the party president within three days of the visit, he added. It is alleged Khan had forcibly taken land from farmers and the Rampur district administration has lodged around two dozen cases against the former Cabinet minister.