After Bihar the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen's (AIMIM) has turned its attention on Bengal.
With the Assembly elections scheduled to take place in mid 2021 AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi has aired his view to visit Bengal sometime soon.
He is known to have conducted a meeting of senior party functionaries at Hyderabad. The meeting held on Saturday with party representatives from Bengal has been said to be “satisfactory.” The Bengal AIMIM leaders have told Owaisi that the situation in the State was perfect for his entry and that the party could get more support than expected from the minority voters, many of who are disillusioned with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee’s style of functioning.
The meeting was held for taking their (Bengal leaders’) detailed views with regards to upcoming polls and the political situation in the state, party sources said. According to sources Owaisi was briefed by the Bengal party leaders about AIMIM’s areas of strength.
The meeting was “fruitful” Owaisi was quoted as saying. “He was briefed about the political situation in the State which he listened with quite interest and asked us whether we are prepared to jump into the electoral fray to which we said we can,” a Bengal AIMIM leader said.
Bengal has about 27 percent minority voters though in actual terms it reaches 30 percent because the minority voter turnout is more than that of the majority community.
According to sources while the Muslims voters may impact about 125 out of 294 Assembly seats the AIMIM has a sizeable presence in about 35 seats.
The Trinamool Congress has recently come down heavily on the AIMIM and Owaisi for its alleged act of “cutting the anti-BJP votes.” Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee whose party commands most of the Muslim votes told a recent meeting that “some parties from Hyderabad funded by the BJP are trying to come to Bengal… they will break the secular fabric of the State and help the BJP by cutting minority votes as they did in Bihar.”
She however expected that the Bengal electorate was smart enough to understand the game plan. Another party leader Saugato Roy said that whatever influence the AIMIM would have would be on the Urdu-speaking minorities which would in the final run not affect the TMC’s catchment area.
While in Bihar AIMIM won 5 seats, in Maharashtra it won 2 after fielding 44 candidates. In Jharkhand too it could not sink its teeth though it fielded 16 candidates. According to TMC sources though the AIMIM had expanded its base in the State it has since weakened after its State party leader Syed Ahmed Pasha joined the Trinamool along with 25 others.
However the AIMIM says that its organizational network has remained intact and Pasha is still with the party.