Who’s Afraid of Azam Khan? Of 87 FIRs Pending, 84 Filed Since Yogi Became UP CM

As Uttar Pradesh rolls into the first phase of its assembly elections on February 10 and leaders of all prominent political parties’ exchange barbs at poll rallies, one stalwart is conspicuous by his absence.

Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan, the sitting Member of Parliament from Rampur, has been incarcerated for the last two years.

The Adityanath government's efforts to ensure that Khan is not able to campaign for his party started with an election petition before the Allahabad high court, challenging his son Abdullah Azam Khan’s election from Suar constituency in the 2017 assembly election on the ground that he was not 25 years of age on the date of the election.

Although the doctor who delivered Abdullah Azam Khan in the Queen Mary Hospital, Lucknow, herself testified as to the date of delivery, the high court disregarded her testimony saying she could not possibly identify the baby she delivered as the man standing before her in court.

The high court therefore set aside Abdullah Azam’s election.

This case has been used as the basis for registering several FIRs against Azam Khan, his son Abdullah and wife Tazeen Fatima for allegedly forging various identification documents related to Abdullah.

There are a total of 87 criminal cases pending against Azam Khan, of which as many as 84 FIRs were registered in the two years after the BJP came into power in Uttar Pradesh in 2017. Eighty one out of these 84 cases were registered during the period immediately before and after the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Khan's supporters believe that these FIRs have been registered based on complaints procured by the Bhartiya Janata Party with the intention to keep Khan incarcerated indefinitely.

Most of these FIRs have been filed with inordinate and inexplicable delay.

One of the FIRs was registered 16 years after the complaint was filed. Twenty two of the FIRs were registered 13 years after the alleged crime took place. These 22 FIRs allege that Azam Khan’s Mohammad Ali Jauhar University was built on land that has been grabbed or forcibly acquired by the Samajwadi Party leader from farmers. The university was established in 2006 and no complaints were filed till July 2019. However, between July 12 and 20, 2019, 22 FIRs were registered at Rampur’s Azeem Nagar police station, at odd hours of the morning and night.

The first FIR was registered on July 12 at 2.19 am. On July 16, between 10.30 pm and 11.30 pm, eight FIRs were registered. Between 10.30 pm on July 18 and 6 am on July 19, 10 FIRs were registered.

"It almost seems like 13 years after their land was allegedly grabbed, farmers woke up in the middle of the night and approached the police in groups of eight and 10," says Azam Khan’s son Abdullah Azam Khan.