Number of Muslims, Yadavs inflated in Bihar caste survey, says Shah
Muzaffarpur (Bihar), Nov 5
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday accused Bihar’s Nitish Kumar government of deliberately showing inflated numbers of Muslims and Yadavs in the state’s caste survey as part of its “appeasement politics” while giving a “raw deal” to backward classes as a whole.
Addressing a rally at Patahi in Muzaffarpur district, Shah also charged the Nitish Kumar government with “Muslim appeasement” and warned that this could lead to “big trouble” in areas bordering Nepal and Bangladesh.
Widely regarded as the BJP’s principal strategist, Shah pointed out that his party was sharing power with Nitish Kumar when the government in the state had ordered the caste survey.
“But we had no inkling what Nitish Kumar would do under pressure from (RJD president) Lalu Prasad. The population of Yadavs and Muslims has been inflated. And injustice has been done to OBCs and EBCs,” said Shah.
The former BJP president also alleged that the Congress, which has likened the survey to an “x-ray of society” and vowed to hold a nationwide caste census if it was voted to power, “has always been hostile towards OBCs”. Reeling out names of Bihar towns such as Sasaram, Bihar Sharif, Purnea, Katihar and Bhagalpur, which have in recent times witnessed minor communal incidents, the Union Home Minister said, “In these places and, in fact, the whole of Bihar, a politics of Muslim appeasement is on display.”