"Hum apne ghar mein khush the. Lekin apki abtar halat dekhi nahin jaati. Hum apko apna haq dilane aaye hain (We were happy in our home state. But we cannot see your pitiable condition any longer. We have come to give you your rights)." This is the line Akbaruddin repeats in in Muslim-dominated areas of Maharashtra.
Clad in sherwani-pyjama, clean-shaven Akbaruddin metamorphoses into a polarizing politician once he reaches the dais. If the deeply disillusioned Muslim crowd craves rhetoric, the leader doesn't disappoint them. Akbaruddin lives up to his reputation as a "rabidly communal" leader. At his first rally in Mumbai at Nagpada, he revisited the destruction of the Babri mosque. He then told the crowd: "Name every new mosque as Babri mosque. There should be at least one lakh Babri mosques across the country." He makes much of PM Narendra Modi gifting of a copy of the Gita to the Japanese Emperor. "Why didn't he gift a copy of the Constitution? They want India to turn into a Hindu rashtra," he sais. His rhetoric is greeted with the slogan 'Allah-o-Akbar'.
"What Akbaruddin is saying today, I said a decade ago. Voters don't get influenced by emotional issues now," said SP legislator Abu Azmi.
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