12-08-2006, 02:27 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Dalit Muslims in SC category? No, says BSP </b>
Pioneer.com
Akhilesh Suman | New Delhi
Is Mayawati willing to risk alienating the Muslims just to consolidate her Dalit votebank before the much awaited Assembly elections?
While the UPA Government is mulling some mechanism for Muslims in general and Dalit Muslims in particular, ahead of the State Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, ruling Samajwadi Party's major challenger Bahujan Samaj Party is not ready to accept the incorporation of Muslims in the existing Scheduled Caste category.
<b>"Where is a Dalit category in Muslims? Do you see it anywhere? If it were there it would have been envisaged by the makers of the Indian Constitution like Baba Saheb Bhim Rao Ambedkar,"</b> Rajesh Verma, a Mayawati confidant and leader of BSP in Lok Sabha told The Pioneer.
<b>"For 60 years after independence, no one saw Dalits in Muslims, but now all of a sudden Sachar Committee has discovered it," </b>he said, hinting that the Congress wanted to use the Sachar report as a ploy to attract the Muslim voters.
In a State where Muslims form a formidable vote bank capable of affecting the future of any political party, the BSP leader's statement is indicative of the strategy being chalked out by the Dalit outfit.
"If Congress wants to give reservation to Muslims, we have no problems, but we will not let them encroach on the existing reservation for Scheduled Castes," Verma said.
Pointing out that the Muslims are already present in the reserved category of the OBCs, the BSP leader warned that any move to carve out a place for some of them in Dalit category would be treated as a conspiracy against Dalits.
Earlier the BSP supremo Mayawati had also tried to distance her party from the policy of Muslim 'appeasement' when she said in Merut that Muslims liked fanatic leaders. She, however, clarified later that she did not mean that all Muslims are fanatic.
Observers feel that BSP is trying to show the mighty upper caste, especially the Brahmins of the state that she is not in the game of minority appeasement and can call a spade a spade. Though a risky gamble, this strategy may work for her as she foresees a tough competition for Muslim votes in UP between the Congress and the SP.Â
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Pioneer.com
Akhilesh Suman | New Delhi
Is Mayawati willing to risk alienating the Muslims just to consolidate her Dalit votebank before the much awaited Assembly elections?
While the UPA Government is mulling some mechanism for Muslims in general and Dalit Muslims in particular, ahead of the State Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, ruling Samajwadi Party's major challenger Bahujan Samaj Party is not ready to accept the incorporation of Muslims in the existing Scheduled Caste category.
<b>"Where is a Dalit category in Muslims? Do you see it anywhere? If it were there it would have been envisaged by the makers of the Indian Constitution like Baba Saheb Bhim Rao Ambedkar,"</b> Rajesh Verma, a Mayawati confidant and leader of BSP in Lok Sabha told The Pioneer.
<b>"For 60 years after independence, no one saw Dalits in Muslims, but now all of a sudden Sachar Committee has discovered it," </b>he said, hinting that the Congress wanted to use the Sachar report as a ploy to attract the Muslim voters.
In a State where Muslims form a formidable vote bank capable of affecting the future of any political party, the BSP leader's statement is indicative of the strategy being chalked out by the Dalit outfit.
"If Congress wants to give reservation to Muslims, we have no problems, but we will not let them encroach on the existing reservation for Scheduled Castes," Verma said.
Pointing out that the Muslims are already present in the reserved category of the OBCs, the BSP leader warned that any move to carve out a place for some of them in Dalit category would be treated as a conspiracy against Dalits.
Earlier the BSP supremo Mayawati had also tried to distance her party from the policy of Muslim 'appeasement' when she said in Merut that Muslims liked fanatic leaders. She, however, clarified later that she did not mean that all Muslims are fanatic.
Observers feel that BSP is trying to show the mighty upper caste, especially the Brahmins of the state that she is not in the game of minority appeasement and can call a spade a spade. Though a risky gamble, this strategy may work for her as she foresees a tough competition for Muslim votes in UP between the Congress and the SP.Â
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