Amit Shah begins door-to-door campaign, meets exodus-affected families in Kairana

Kairana: Union Home minister and senior BJP leader Amit Shah kicked off his poll campaign in the western Uttar Pradesh on Saturday from the Kairana Assembly constituency, which had been in the news for the Hindu exodus incident in 2016 or riots for a long time. Along with the door-to-door campaign at the Teachers' Colony, he met the victim families as well. He visited an almost seven-decades-old Sadhu sweet shop at the narrow lane of the Chowk Bazar area, whose owner Rakesh Garg was shifted to Ambala, Haryana in 2014 following receipt of a letter from a local gang for extortion of Rs 20 lakh.

However, he later returned to UP to continue his family business. The former BJP president visited Garg's residence and spoke to his family members. While speaking to the media, Shah said he spoke with as many as 11 members of one Mittal family who informed him that they no longer live in fear. According to the Union Home minister, these families were forced to leave the state due to erstwhile law and order scenarios.

However, political experts feel that the saffron party is leaving no stone unturned to retain power in the Hindi heartland amid resentment across western Uttar Pradesh. Not only the farmers' protest, the caste and communal ratio in this part may create more hardships for the Bharatiya Janata Party. Hence, Shah, who is known for his micro-management and called 'Chanakya' for his election management, tried to send out a message over the Yogi government's clear and stern message regarding law and order and its success story of stemming riots in this part of the state.

"Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath implemented different schemes of PM Narendra Modi. However, the first and foremost issue was to improve the law and order," Shah told media persons while visiting the clogged Chawk Bazar. Also, he is confident that in the upcoming Assembly elections, BJP will get more than 300 seats. He even added: "Pleased to see the changed atmosphere."

Western Uttar Pradesh traditionally has a dense population of the minority community, who are said to be core voters of the Samajwadi Party or vote for non-BJP parties. Kairana has 85 per cent of the Muslim population and 15 per cent of the Hindu population. Therefore, since BJP stalwart Hukum Singh's demise, it has been hard for the saffron party to win either in the Assembly elections or in the last Lok Sabha by-polls. For the past century, Kairana has been witnessing the dominance of Hasans and Singhs, belonging to one family under a single khap. BJP's candidate and late Hukum Singh's daughter Mriganka Singh earlier had contested the Assembly elections in 2017 for the first time on a BJP ticket. Then, her cousin Anil Chouhan contested from Kairana on an RLD ticket against Mriganka. Therefore, Hassan kin Nahid Hassan had won due to the division of votes. Again in 2018, after the demise of Babu Hukum Singh, BJP nominated Mriganka Singh in the Lok Sabha by-elections. There also Munawwar Hassan's wife Tabassum Hassan won.

Kairana has 1.37 lakh Muslim voters, 2.75 lakh Gurjars, 24,650 Jaat voters, 4,930 Thakur voters, 4,0423 Kashyap voters, 9,800 Dalit voters, 12,200 Saini voters, 8,862 Brahmin voters, 6,154 Vaishya voters, 10,400 Nai and Barhai (barbers and carpenters), 8,364 Kauri voters, 6,250 Bawaria voters, and other voters are 22,000.

Locals claimed that from 2014 to 2016, a total of 347 Hindu families migrated from Kairana. During the door-to-door campaign at the Teachers' Colony — a Hindu residential colony of more than 800 families, Amit Shah also distributed pamphlets with the slogan "Puri Hui Har Aas, Ghar Ghar Hua Vikas" (fulfilling the expectations, every household witnessing development). The pamphlet further mentions the state government schemes and Yogi-government's success stories in the five years across all sectors — health, education, free ration, infrastructure etc. This apart, a separate section highlighted the Supreme Court's verdict on Ayodhya.

Later Shah also met the party workers at Shamli, following a meeting with intellectuals at Meerut's Godwin Hotel.