By IANS,
Lucknow : Alarmed at the resentment within the Samajwadi Party over its new ties with former BJP leader Kalyan Singh, party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav Tuesday held a meeting with 100-odd Muslim clerics who gave him a clean chit.
Party general secretary Amar Singh went to the Darul-Uloom Deoband seminary to meet clerics there.
Yadav held a meeting with the clerics for hours and later followed it up with a media interaction here.
While Yadav and most Muslim clerics declined to speak to the media, a few clerics spoke in his favour.
“Mulayam Singh Yadav had convened this meeting to give his clarifications over the confusion that was created on account of his reported statement, giving a clean chit to Kalyan Singh in the Babri Masjid demolition case. After meeting him, we are convinced that the confusion arose essentially on account of misreporting by the media”, said Maulana Idris Baznavi.
“Far from giving Kalyan Singh a clean chit, Mulayam Singh Yadav clearly held him morally responsible for the demolition of the Babri mosque,” Yadav added, and accused the media of “being in a habit of twisting and turning facts”.
Kalyan Singh was the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh when the 16th century Babri mosque in Ayodhya was razed to the ground.
As he last month quit the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) once again and his son Rajvir Singh joined the Samajwadi Party, Yadav and Amar Singh have faced criticism from many in the party.
Maulana Yasin Akhtar Misbahi, convener of a lesser-known Muslim Convention, said: “Since Mulayam Singh Yadav has made it clear to us that Kalyan Singh would never be made a member of his party, we have no objection to his association with Kalyan Singh.”
Replying to a query, he said, “Though we always rated Kalyan Singh as communal and as the key culprit behind the demolition of the Babri mosque, I have reason to believe that his departure from a highly communal political party would weaken that party.”
Maulana Mohammad Ismail Qadri, who came here from a village on the outskirts of this state capital, declared: “Now that he has clarified his position, we are with Mulayam Singh Yadav.”
Most clerics avoided pointed queries about Kalyan Singh’s allegedly communal track record.
When their attention was drawn to Kalyan Singh’s allegedly inflammatory statements in the past, Maulana Ghulam Abdul Qadir Ali said: “First of all, we would like to know the date of that recording and then we must also ascertain the authenticity of the recordings.”