Congress Alleges BRS for Misleading Muslims

Hyderabad: Congress minority leaders, including minority welfare minister Mohammad Azharuddin and state government adviser Mohammad Ali Shabbir, accused the BRS of misleading Muslims in the Jubilee Hills Constituency by spreading false claims that the Congress government had ignored minority welfare.

Addressing a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan on Wednesday along with minority leaders Zafar Javeed, Azmatullah Hussaini and Mohd Faheem, they said the BRS had no moral right to speak about Muslim welfare after a decade marked by neglect, discrimination and betrayal on key issues such as reservations, minority education, and Waqf properties.

Azharuddin expressed confidence that the Congress would win the Jubilee Hills bypoll with a decisive majority. He alleged that BRS leaders were resorting to false propaganda to divert public attention from their past failures. He said the Congress leadership was united and determined to expose the BRS’s hypocrisy.

Shabbir reminded that BRS president K. Chandrashekar Rao had promised to implement 12% Muslim reservation within four months of coming to power in 2014, but failed to deliver even after ten years. He said the BRS government had jeopardised the existing 4% reservation by failing to defend it in the Supreme Court, as no government advocate represented the case. “It was the Congress that fought to protect it,” he said.

Shabbir further said Chandrashekar Rao contested from Kamareddy not to serve the people but to defeat a Muslim leader who worked for community rights. “If he genuinely cared for minorities, he should have contested from Goshamahal against the BJP,” he remarked, calling Chandrashekar Rao’s actions politically motivated and biased.

Listing BRS failures, Shabbir pointed out that over 80% of minority colleges were shut down during its rule and Muslims were denied representation in universities, state government's commissions and the TGPSC. He added that not a single Muslim vice chancellor was appointed in the 11 state universities. On Waqf matters, he said Chandrashekar Rao had sealed the Waqf records office in 2017 instead of restoring encroached lands or empowering the Waqf Board.