By Saiyed Danish, TwoCircles.net,
New Delhi: According to the political pundits, Aam Addmi party (AAP) is the most popular party among the youth in Delhi and may claim 50% votes of Muslims, Dalits and poor from the Congress party and about the same percentage of middle and upper class votes traditionally aligned with the BJP.
Unperturbed by such speculations is Rashid Ilmi, brother of Shazia Ilmi, the AAP candidate from the R.K Puram legislative assembly seat. Rashid is hellbent on his claims of “unmasking the true face” of her sister and rival candidate.
Rashid Ilmi
Welcome to R.K.Puram which has become of the most interesting poll battleground due to the family feud of this brother-sister duo coming out in the open in the form of an electoral tussle. At one side we have the officially richest candidate of AAP and former star anchor of the erstwhile Star News and on the other hand is his own twitter savvy brother, who is contesting elections on AAP’s breakaway party Bhartiya Aam Aadmi Party (BAAP) who is no mood to relinquish his resolve to “reveal the true face” of her sister.
As for Shazia Ilmi, there are several factors responsible for her meteoric rise in city’s politics after AAP finalised her as its candidate. For one she is a female elite Muslim face with the potential to have a middle-class voters’ appeal. Secondly, her forays into the slum clusters and JJ colonies of Delhi seem to be working in her favour of elevating her image to a pro poor one. But of all the people in the world, her brother vehemently warns that she is not the one she claims to be.
“The objective behind my candidacy is to unmask her in the election. I want the voters to think that is their AAP really clean, who has been involved in domestic violence, property grabbing, asset concealing in nomination papers?” he comments.
A mention of AAP and he calls its goals unrealistic. “You must have read the AAP manifesto. Most of the big promises they made are impossible to be fulfilled. They are saying that they will bring Jan Lokpal on December 29 but that is the subject of centre and not state,” he says.
“You have seen the sting operation on AAP which exposed the reality behind their funding. Even Arvind Kejriwal has taken money upto Rs. 2 cr and if you talk of Shazia Ilmi, she emerges as the expert of making black money white. I do not know with what face AAP claims to be fighting against corruption,” he taunts.
When he is asked on his plans to counter Shazia’s move in visiting the slums and meeting the poor as he is a new face and filed his nomination on November 16, he said, “Just waving flag from Anna’s stage and doing road show is not social activism. She talks of Jan Lokpal and human rights but there is no lokpal at her home. She inflicts atrocities on her mother and talks of human rights. She concealed her father’s assets while filing her nomination against which I have also knocked the court. She is so rich that she had to hide her real assets. What kind of social activism is this?” he asks.
Talking about BAAP, Rashid Ilmi says, “It is a group which has been formed to address the real issue of Anna ji as AAP has betrayed his visions,” he points out. He also puts aside the allegations that BAAP is a party of those people who could not get a ticket from AAP. “Certainly not, they are here to expose the corruption within AAP and public support is with us.”