Yogi Adityanath: Umar Khalid’s father hatching conspiracy with Akhilesh

Reacting to Adityanath’s remarks, the SP said he was trying to polarise the Assembly polls.

Addressing BJP’s Samajik Pratinidhi Sammelans here, Adityanath said, “Opposition parties can go to any extent. You must have seen who recently came to meet a party: Umar Khalid’s father, who says Bharat tere tukde honge.

“That person (Khalid’s father) comes to meet the Samajwadi Party president and assures him not to worry as he is hatching a conspiracy for the party,” said the CM. “What do you expect if these people come (to power)?”

Arrested in September last year, Khalid has been booked under the anti-terror Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act for allegedly instigating the riots in northeast Delhi last year.

SP spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said, “He (CM) is raising such issues to polarise the upcoming elections on communal lines. Everybody knows that as elections near, the BJP tries to polarise the society.”

Chaudhary said he was not aware of a meeting between Umar Khalid’s father and Akhilesh. “The SP is a socialist and democratic party. Any person and organisation is free to meet and extend its support,” he said.

The CM alleged that the previous Congress, SP or BSP governments tore the social fabric in the name of casteism and threw the state into the fire of riots.

These parties for their self-interest had, Adityanath said, mortgaged the state to the mafia, but this changed after the BJP government came to power.

Claiming to have fought the pandemic in “a proper way”, he said, “Had this pandemic come during a Congress government, imagine, what would have happened. The brother and sister would have fled to Italy…. Had this (outbreak) occurred during the SP government, there would have been a race between the uncle and nephew as to who should grab how much without caring for the poor and how to give contracts to the mafia.”