NEW DELHI
The Chandrayangutta Assembly constituency, one of the 15 constituencies of Hyderabad district in Telangana, has been presided over by Akbaruddin Owaisi (younger brother of Assadudin Owaisi) for more than two decades. Even now, he has been able to continue his dominance due to the Muslim population being in a majority in the constituency.
A political analyst said, “People like when he speaks. And he thoroughly represents Muslims. Moreover, there is no Muslim leader as popular as him; so nobody stands a chance to win against him. The constituency has more than 65% Muslim voters. There is also an understanding among people that both the Owaisi brothers work in their constituencies, although Muslims do have Congress in mind, but not as much as Akbaruddin Owaisi. He is closer to the electorate than any leader from Congress.”
In the last Assembly elections (2018), Akbaruddin had won the seat by amassing around 68% votes and dominating exceedingly the 50% symbolic mark. In 2014, he had again won by a huge margin by pocketing around 60% vote share. Now, Congress has fielded Boya Nagesh against Akbaruddin Owaisi.
Since 1999, Akbaruddin Owaisi has been elected with a massive majority by the voters of the constituency each time he contested from this segment.
Before Owaisi, Amanullah Khan from Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT) had retained the seat for five terms. He represented the Chandrayangutta Assembly constituency between 1978 and 1994. In 1999, he ran again for the sixth time as an MBT candidate, but lost to Owaisi by margin of (6.2%) 11,920 votes.
Moreover, AIMIM holds sway over much of Hyderabad’s old city area, especially in Charminar, Chandrayangutta, Yakutpura, Malakpet, Karwan, and Bahadurpura. The Hyderabad MP personally holds a lot of sway over Muslims in the rest of Telangana and is responsible for swinging minority votes in favour of the BRS, with which the AIMIM tied up in 2014 and 2018. A BRS leader said, “Half-a-dozen seats for the AIMIM are fixed, nobody can dislodge them from there. One, it is a Muslim majority region; another is they don’t disappear, but listen to people.”
For BRS supremo and Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, popularly known as KCR, Asaduddin’s support would play a critical role in nullifying the Congress’ efforts to reach out to the minority community voters and counter the BJP.
All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi (brother of Akbaruddin) recently took a jibe at Rahul Gandhi over his allegations that AIMIM fields candidates wherever Congress contests the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) by “taking money from the saffron party”.
In a post on X, Asaduddin Owaisi asked Rahul Gandhi how much his party took to back the UPA government in 2008 on the nuclear deal with the United States.