Muslims were vote bank for Congress RJD Chirag Paswan

Patna, Mar 24 (PTI) Union minister Chirag Paswan on Monday squarely blamed the Congress and its Bihar ally RJD for the plight of Muslims, claiming that the community was treated as a "vote bank" by these parties.
    The Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) chief was talking to reporters on the sidelines of an ‘Iftaar’ organised by his outfit, which was attended by NDA partners like Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, who heads the JD(U), and Deputy CM Samrat Choudhary.
    The Hajipur MP was asked about the announcement of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind president Maulana Arshad Madani that the organisation will stay away from ‘Iftaar’ and ‘Eid Milan’ hosted by Paswan, Kumar and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu, in protest against these NDA leaders' “inability to thwart the Waqf Bill”.
    Paswan said that he is a Hindu and yet hosts ‘Iftaar’ because when Hindus and Muslims break bread together, it sends across a message of harmony and goodwill.
    If a religious organisation or its leader takes a political stance on such an occasion, it goes against the purity of the event, he said.
    "Madani sahab is an elderly person with whom my family has enjoyed close relations. I respect him a lot. He has a grouse that he has expressed with the ‘fatwa’ (decree) against me. Let me express a small grouse myself.
    "I would like to remind Madani sahab of the Sachar Committee report which highlighted the dismal condition of Muslims in the country. Which party can be blamed for this? Barring a small period when Atal Bihari Vajpayee ran a government, the country has been ruled by the Congress. Similarly, in Bihar, the RJD was in power till 2005," said Paswan.
    The Union minister said he honours the decision of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind to boycott his ‘Iftaar’, but Madani is “not doing the right thing by giving patronage to Congress and RJD, which have been treating Muslims like vote bank and are responsible for the community's plight".
    Recalling the much talked about political move of late Ram Vilas Paswan in 2005, the LJP(RV) president said, "I shall continue to follow in the footsteps of my father, who had put his own political career at stake by promising his party's support to whoever made a Muslim the chief minister of Bihar".

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)