HYDERABAD: All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) will request the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly to give the party the status of leader of Opposition, now that several Congress MLAs have defected to the TRS, said party chief Asaduddin Owaisi on Saturday.
AIMIM, which has seven seats in the Assembly, is now the second largest party after 12 of 18 Congress MLAs defected to the TRS.
“We will request the Speaker to give AIMIM the post of Leader of Opposition as we are the second largest party in the State. We have more numbers than Congress. Our party will meet the Speaker and we expect that he will take positive action,” Owaisi said.
The four-time Hyderabad MP also slammed the Congress’ criticisms over the defections and cited the example of Tandur municipal elections where he said, the party had ‘bought’ a few of AIMIM’s corporators.
He said, “In Tandur, when the municipality chairman elections were underway, Congress had bought four of our corporators, denying us the chairman’s seat. Here (Hyderabad) too, they took a few our corporators. They did not care about defections back then.” Owaisi also questioned the Congress’ silence in 2014, in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, when N Chandrababu Naidu had allegedly poached 19 MLAs and 7 MPs of YSRCP.
He also said that it was not strictly necessary for a party to have 10 per cent of the total Assembly seats, citing the example of Delhi Assembly where BJP has been given the status in spite of having just 3 MLAs in a House of 70.
Owaisi said that the law gives permission for mergers while dismissing the Congress party’s protests over the issue.
He instead asked the party to introspect. He said, “The Congress still has time to introspect the reason behind the exit of these many leaders from the party. There is so much confusion in your top leadership. Clear that out first. If you are weak in politics then it is obvious that someone is going to take advantage of you. Close that deficit,” he advised.
Akbar for LoP?
If all goes well for AIMIM, and the Speaker approves their request to be the main Opposition in the State Assembly, Chandrayangutta MLA Akbaruddin Owaisi could be the Leader of the Opposition.
Akbaruddin is now the leader of AIMIM in the Assembly and he recently got re-elected as the MLA from Chandrayangutta for the fifth consecutive time.
Though he has been ailing for quite some time now, a party official dismissed the claims and confirmed that he would be the one to helm the position.