Onus now on Owaisi, AIMIM to save Textile City turning into Udta Malegaon
The All India Majils e Ittehadul Muslimeen won the 2024 Assembly elections on the plank of drug addictions, and to save the Textile City from hooligans and from turning it into “Udta Malegaon”
[AIMIM Chief Asaduddin Owaisi in a roadshow in Malegaon on Nov 17, 2024. Also seen is Malegaon MLA Mufti Ismail Qasmi. (Image: X/@MuftiIsmailQsm)]
Malegaon: The All India Majils e Ittehadul Muslimeen won the 2024 Assembly elections on the plank of drug addictions, and to save the Textile City from hooligans and from turning it into “Udta Malegaon”.
The AIMIM campaign hit the chord with the masses who re-elected Mufti Ismail Qasmi despite large scale unsatisfaction and anger against him as far as his record as MLA is concerned.
Looking back, Mufti Ismail Qasmi had in the party’s very first election rally at Khayaban-e-Nishat Chowk in Qilla in October accused Asif Shaikh, former Congress MLA and EX Mayor who lost the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly Election by just 162 votes, of hobnobbing with drug pedlars.
Sensing that the issue is generating a chord with the people of Malegaon, when Akbaruddin Owaisi - senior AIMIM leader, younger brother of AIMIM Chief Asaduddin Owaisi and Telangana MLA, visited the Powerloom City on November 06 to campaign for Mufti Ismail, the focus of his speech was to choose between “Acchai and Burai” (good and evil) and “Nasha Mukt Malegaon” (drug free Malegaon).
AIMIM Chief and Hyderabad MP, Asaduddin Owaisi, also raised the issue of drug addictions when he visited the Textile City on November 17, 2024, and asked the people of Malegaon to vote in order to make the city drugs free.
As the assembly election campaign progressed, candidates from other parties – including Ejaz Baig of Congress and Shan e Hind of Samajwadi Party, too started raising the issue, some of them publicly naming a close relative of Asif Shaikh.
Countering the charges and denying the allegations against his supporters, Asif Shaikh pointed out how “drug peddlers” and “hooligans” shared the AIMIM stage when Asaduddin Owaisi, Akbaruddin Owaisi and other party leaders sought vote to make Malegaon drug free.
In the end, the fence sitters - now billed as “silent voters” who ultimately favoured Mufti Ismail Qasmi, said they gave the sitting MLA another chance because “they do not wish hooliganism prevail in the city and expecting the AIMIM will make the city free from drugs”.
For ummid.com, drug addictions and hooliganism in the city are not political issues. Furthermore, we do not support any political party, individual or group if they are directly or indirectly involved. For us, this is a matter of concerns for the survival of the City's coming generations.
As a reminder, ummid.com had raised the issue in a detailed article published on October 07, 2024 – about a week before the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly Election Notification, highlighting how the drug menace in Malegaon that was limited to a small section of powerloom sector till recently has penetrated deeper among the labour class and the so called elites simultaneously knocking the doors of schools and colleges.
In its article, ummid.com had also detailed how cannabis, marijuana and antidepressant drug Alprazolam - a scheduled drug sold illegally by the code names ‘kutta goli’, ‘button’ etc, are slowly and quietly being replaced by Mephedrone or MD. It's good that the issue became a major poll issue.
Probably realising the urgency needed to tackle the issue, Malegaon Police too came into action, and arrested a local resident only five days after the election result and seized from him MD powder worth INR 2,27,600, according to Additional SP Malegaon Aniket Bharati.
How the drugs addiction is rapidly spreading its wings in the City can also be gauged from the fact that the local police filed as many as 26 cases under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS Act) in the current year 2024.
This is more than the double of 11 cases under the NDPS Act filed in 2023, and a huge jump from just 01 case registered in 2022, according to the details provided to the media by Aniket Bharati.
People of Malegaon have given their verdict to make the City free from drugs and hooligans, and have chosen “Acchai” over ”Burai”.
The local Police too have sprang into action.
The local residents are now looking at the AIMIM and its leadership to know how they plan to take the matter forward.
AIMIM Chief Asaduddin Owaisi - along with AIMIM Maharashtra President Imtiaz Jaleel and other party leaders, is in Malegaon today (Sunday Dec 1, 2024) to address the party’s victory rally at the historic Mushawerat Chowk.
The local residents are watching with fingers crossed to know how and when Asaduddin Owaisi launches the fight against drug peddlers and hooligans in Malegaon.
To make a start, Asaduddin Owaisi can begin with cleaning his own house as allegations are also rife that hooligans, and those involved in drugs peddling are in the AIMIM Malegaon ranks too.
Your time starts now.
[The writer, Aleem Faizee, is Founder Editor ummid.com. He can be reached at aleem.faizee@ummid.com.]
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