“Hum Titahari nahi hain jo pair upar kar ke aasmaan girne ka intezar karein (I’m not the Titahari bird who will lift its legs and wait for the sky to fall),” said Samajwadi Party’s (SP) Ghazipur candidate Afzal Ansari when questioned about the threat of his disqualification from the electoral battle. The reference is to a local folklore about the Titahari bird which sleeps with her feet pointed towards the sky, apprehensive that the sky might fall and her feet will keep it at bay.
The Allahabad High Court may reserve its order after hearing the rejoinder arguments from Afzal’s defence on Monday. Prosecution has demanded that his conviction under the Gangster Act be upheld. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers in Ghazipur are hopeful that the court judgement will go against Ansari, thereby, disqualifying him from the election process, just ahead of polling Ghazipur on June 1.
Afzal Ansari has fielded his daughter Nusrat Ansari as an Independent candidate from the Ghazipur seat. When asked if this was his back up plan in case of disqualification, a combative Ansari pointed out his family’s freedom fighter legacy and his biggest political competitor Jammu and Kashmir LG Manoj Sinha.”Manoj Sinha’s son has the right to dream politically, but Afzal Ansari’s daughter doesn’t? Ansari Sahab’s (Afzal Ansari’s father who was a freedom fighter) daughter was Zohra Begum, she went to jail fighting the British, her family members do not have the right to fight elections? We are fighting this election against those who want to keep the oppressed, oppressed,” Ansari told News18 at his Mohammadabad resident.
His daughter Nusrat, a graduate from the Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi, had already left to campaign. On the face of it, it looks like a father-daughter contest. but Ansari supporters have no doubt that Afzal Ansari has decided to hand over the political legacy to his daughter, unwilling to take any chances with the court order.
Ansari was disqualified as an MP last year after a special MP-MLA court in Ghazipur convicted and sentenced him for four years in a Gangsters Act case related to former BJP MLA Krishnanand Rai. The Supeme Court stayed the conviction paving the way for the two-time MP to recontest Lok Sabha polls. The Supreme Court, however, has asked that the case be decided by High Court by June 30.
Meanwhile, Afzal Ansari is hoping the sympathy card will help the family sail through in the voter’s court. “Government might try with all its might but ultimately what janta decides will prevail. Inquilab is in my destiny. I am Afzal Ansari and I am meant to struggle, I will do it till my last breath,” Afzal, who started his political career with the Communist Party, told News18.
When asked about the Uttar Pradesh government’s charge that Mukhtar Ansari, Afzal’s brother, was a mafia, Afzal countered saying he was actually a “messiah who was poisoned in jail”. “The fact that even after his death, everyone is referring to him, from the media to UP CM to the country’s Prime Minister, that tells you that Mukhtar is amar (Immortal). You might call him mafia, but for public he was a hero. When the BJP is wiped clean on June 4, you will know that he was a hero. Use mitti mein mila diya, to puraskar to milna chahiye (they should be rewarded for runing him), but you will see on June 4 whether they get a reward or punishment. If they are punished, you would know that everything that is being said about Mukhtar and mafia was a lie,” Afzal said.
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