Amid political controversy, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday clarified that by meeting with the controversial cleric Maulana Tauqeer Raza Khan, who had issued a fatwa against Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen, he was not playing any communal card ahead of the assembly elections.
“I want to clear one thing first. I went to offer prayers in Bareilly. Maulana Tauqeer Raza is a respected man, and I met him because he is the head there. And I appealed to him that everyone should save this nation. We are trying to tackle evil politics with love and peace. I have no idea about charges levelled against him,” he told media here today.
“We spoke to him again today, and he told us that the charges on him are wrong. Tauqeer Raza said he had never issued a fatwa, because only a Mufti can issue one, and he is not a Mufti. He said there was a board of 100 members, and he was a member of that board some time back. And the Mufti issued a fatwa. He said he was targetted because people knew him well,’ he added.
Kejriwal further said that both his party and Maulana Tauqeer Raza do not believe in the politics of violence.
He also said that there were no plans of the controversial cleric campaigning for Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and that there is no question of forming an alliance.
“We are not forming an alliance. I just went to Bareilly, offered my prayers at the mosques, met him and came back. If there are any charges levelled against him, let the law take its own course,” he said.
Earlier on November 1, Arvind Kejriwal met Maulana Tauqeer Raza Khan in Bareilly, which sparked a political conspiracy today, saying that the AAP leader is playing a communal card ahead of the assembly elections in Delhi.
According to reports, Maulana Khan had said in 2007 that the only way a fatwa against Taslima Nasreen, whose writings clerics denounced as anti-Islam, could be withdrawn was if she burnt her books and left India.
