Ex-BJP MLA alleges Shah-Owaisi pact, joins AAP (Second Lead, correcting para three)

Former Gujarat BJP MLA Yatin Oza, who was once close to BJP President Amit Shah, has alleged that Shah had a secret pact with AIMIM leader Akbaruddin Owaisi ahead of the Bihar polls last year.

Oza, who has been lying low, made the allegation in a letter to Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal.

Oza, who told reporters here after Kejriwal's two-day Gujarat visit that he was joining the AAP, said in his July 4 letter that Shah had a secret meeting at his residence on September 15 last year with Akbaruddin Owaisi, younger brother of AIMIM leader Asaduddin Owaisi.

Shah and Owaisi junior worked out a mutually convenient strategy to divide the votes in Bihar on communal lines, Oza alleged.

Oza, a practicing lawyer in the Gujarat High Court, said he was joining the AAP to target Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the "rampant corruption promoted by his government". Oza had contested against Modi in the Maninagar assembly constituency in 2002 but lost.

According to the letter, it was decided that the AIMIM would field candidates in Bihar's Muslim-dominated areas.

"It was also decided that Owaisi will vomit poisonous communal speech, the script of which shall be written by Shah, which may have potentiality to result into communal divide."

His letter alleged that major cases of corruption were investigated by the CAG when Modi ran the government in Gujarat and even now.

"There are at least eight findings of CAG which directly indict the present government about siphoning off funds from the state exchequer for personal gains.

"I shall see that these reports would be handed over to you," Oza told Kejriwal in the letter.

AAP leader Sanjay Singh termed the revelations made by Oza as "shocking" and demanded clarification from BJP on the issue.

"The BJP owes an honest explanation to the people of the country about these shocking charges. AAP demands an immediate clarification from the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP and Amit Shah on this matter," he said in a statement.

--IANS

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