Congress leader Krishnam meets Azam Khan in jail

Lucknow: Congress leader Acharya Pramod Krishnam met Samajwadi Party leader Mohammad Azam Khan in Sitapur district jail on Monday and presented a copy of Bhagwad Gita to Khan to the incarcerated leader which was accepted.

Krishnan had unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha election from Lucknow Lok Sabha constituency.

The Congress leader, after his hour-long meeting with Khan in Sitapur jail, told media persons, "Samajwadi Party is not competent to fight the Bharatiya Janata Party. Azam Khan is a senior leader of the Samajwadi Party, he is being humiliated and persecuted by the BJP but the SP has remained a mute spectator.”

Krishnam further said that the humiliation of Khan, who was not in good health, would have a long-term impact on the politics of Uttar Pradesh and India. Krishnam is the first Congress leader to have met the jailed SP leader and is considered close to Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.

On Sunday, Azam Khan had refused to meet a SP delegation led by party’s legislator Ravidas Mehrotra.

Soon after Pramod Krishnan met Azam Khan, chairman of Congress minority cell Shahnawaz Khan issued an appeal to Muslim MLAs of the Samajwadi Party to split



their party. He said that the SP had 111 MLAs of which 32 were Muslims and to split the SP, only 37 MLAs were needed.  He said that Muslim MLAs of the SP should respect the sentiments and aspirations of the community and act accordingly.

The Congress leader also urged Muslim clerics to mount pressure on Muslim legislators of the SP to break away from their party.

Earlier, Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party chief Shivpal Singh Yadav had met Khan in Sitapur jail while Rashtriya Lok Dal president Jayant Chaudhary too had called on the SP leader’s family in Rampur. The All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) has already extended an invitation to Khan to join their party.

Azam Khan, who has spent almost 26 months in jail, has received bail in almost all cases except one and sources close to him said that he could finally walk free before Eid in May.

Khan, who recently won the Rampur assembly seat with a substantial margin, is apparently being seen as a potential leader of anti-BJP forces in Uttar Pradesh.

 He was elected to Lok Sabha from Rampur in 2019 but he resigned from Lok Sabha seat after winning the 2022 assembly election.