Whatever Behenji said about deal is correct, don’t wish to know details...

CPM’s M K Pandhe said it first, only to be slapped on the wrist by his red-faced general secretary Prakash Karat. Days later, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati made it the pivot of her political attack: Most Muslims are opposed to America (read Bush), so most Muslims are opposed to the India-US nuclear deal.

When facts to test this hypothesis are in short supply, it’s opinion that’s rushed to the rescue of each side. The Indian Express today contacted several Muslim MLAs from both the BSP and the SP and found that opinion is clearly divided on political lines.

BSP MLAs preferred to go by what “Behenji” has said and evaded a direct answer and so did Muslim organisations backing the BSP. SP MLAs, however, attacked Mayawati’s statement as being “communal” underlining the fact that their key political objective was to defeat the BJP.

No wonder then that Amar Singh, at every opportunity in the unfolding political drama, makes it clear that the goal to keep the BJP out is centrestage, the nuclear deal is a mere footnote in the script.

A poll last year of over 18,000 registered voters in 18 states by The Indian Express, CNN-IBN and CSDS, showed that the division among Muslims on the deal approximated the divisions in the larger population — 19 per cent supported the deal and 15 per cent were opposed to it. In other words, the survey found no evidence to support the argument of a monolithic “Muslim opinion” against the deal.

But evidently, few want facts to get in the way.

So Mayawati’s Muslim MLAs admit they know little about the deal — they aren’t alone, only 26 per cent of all those polled in The Indian Express survey admitted to knowing about it — but they all back their supreme leader.

The lone dissenter is Naseeruddin Siddiqui, MLA from Ferozabad, the city of bangles. “I have no idea about the nuclear deal,” he said, “but so far no one from my community in my district has said anything against the deal to me.” The BSP MLA, who is an industrialist, said he knew Mayawati’s views on the subject.

But for the people of Ferozabad, he said, the far more important issue is “cheap Chinese glassware” flooding the domestic market. “If the Communists are so concerned about the interests of India, they should stop imports from China which has ruined the domestic glass industry,” he said.

Another BSP Muslim MLA, speaking on the condition that he not be named, supported the deal, saying, “How can the nuclear deal be anti-Muslim? But since our leader Mayawati has termed the deal anti-Muslim, I support her views”.

Said Rizwan Ahmed Khan, MLA from Kaanth in Moradabad: “This debate has just started, let me find out the details of the nuclear deal, then I will speak.” Asked about Mayawati’s comment that Muslims don’t want the deal, Rizwan said: “It’s a matter involving the highest levels, do not involve me. Whatever our leader Mayawati decides will be acceptable to us”.

Muztaba Siddiqui, MLA from Soroan in Allahabad, said the nuclear deal was “harmful for Muslims” because it had been made “with the specific purpose of harassing Muslims”.

Ghulam Mohammed Khan, MLA from Kaiserganj in Bahraich, said, “I share the views of my leader.” Were Muslims opposed to the deal? “Whatever Behenji has said about the deal is correct and I do not wish to know anything beyond this,” he said.

Waris Ali, MLA from Nanpara in Bahraich, said, “It is not a Hindu or Muslim issue, but the statement made by our leader must have been issued after due deliberations.” Irshad Ahmed Khan, MLA from Sarojini Nagar, Lucknow, was cryptic: “No comments, contact the party high command”.

But Mayawati’s offensive gathered some token rebel support. One dissident Samajwadi Party MP, one SP MLA and one MLA of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), also a dissident, came out to back her saying the deal was anti-Muslim and that Mulayam Singh Yadav had “stabbed Muslims in the back.”

Prominent Shia and Sunni Muslim clerics, including Shia ulema Maulana Kalbe Sadiq, Maulana Hamidul Hasan and Sunni clerics Naib Imam of Idgah Maulana Khalid Rashid met the Chief Minister at her residence and welcomed her stand on the deal.

Munnawar Hasan, the dissident Samajwadi Party MP from Muzaffarnagar, told the media along with SP MLA Gauri Shankar and RLD MLA Kadir Rana, that several other SP MPs would defy the party whip if a confidence vote took place in the Lok Sabha.

Hasan and Rana are, for all practical purposes, now with the BSP. While Munawwar is in charge of BSP for Kairana Lok Sabha constituency in Muzaffarnagar, Kadir Rana is in charge of Muzaffarnagar Lok Sabha seat. Gauri Shanker is the odd man out as he has come out against Mulayam for the first time.

“If Mulayam continues to remain with the UPA on the nuclear deal then we will chart our own course of action, today we are three and tomorrow this number may swell to 13”, said Munawwar Hasan.

The SP shrugged all of this as mere propaganda. Said the party state unit’s working president Shivpal Singh Yadav: “Mayawati has lost her mental balance, that’s why she is making comments that the nuclear deal is anti-Muslim...We don’t need to prove our secular credentials. Instead, Mayawati owes an explanation to the people as she became CM thrice with the BJP’s support. Muslims do not believe Mayawati after having seen her campaign for Narendra Modi in the 2002 Gujarat assembly elections”.

“Dubbing the nuclear deal anti-Muslim and communal is wrong, and those who are using these terms are themselves anti-Muslim,” said SP general secretary and Rajya Sabha member Shahid Siddiqui.

Muslims would never come in the way of something which is in the national interest, he said, qualifying his statement. “They are not against the deal but are opposing it because of their suspicion that the deal would lead the country into an strategic orbit of the US.”

Ironically, he also quotes a survey conducted by his weekly newspaper Nai Dunia that 60 to 70 per cent of Muslims are against the nuclear deal. The survey will be published in the issue which will hit stands later this week. Among Muslims who voted for the Congress in the last election, “one-third of them said they would not vote for the Congress again if it goes ahead with the deal”, Siddiqui said.

But the most vocal refrain among Muslim leaders in the Samajwadi Party is that the community’s real political face-off is with communal forces (read BJP).

“The deal is an international issue and it will not affect the Muslims’ political view. Back home, our only focus is how to stop the RSS-backed BJP from coming to power,” said SP MLA Ziauddin Rizvi.