india

Updated: Sep 22, 2014 00:01 IST

In a show of strength, several locals and NRIs hailing from Azamgarh, would soon leave for Maharashtra to campaign for Samajwadi Party’s (SP) state president Abu Asim Azmi, who hails from Azamgarh.

Maharashtra is the only state other than Uttar Pradesh where SP has maintained its good show. It won four seats in 1995, two in 1999 and four in 2009.

One of the campaigners, Tiflur Rehman, a district executive committee member of SP’s Azamgarh unit, said, “Maharashtra has a large north Indian population.

Nearly 36 assembly constituencies in Maharashtra are dominated by north Indian voters and we will try to win their support.”

Abu Asim Azmi, who is an SP MLA in Maharashtra, and a has been fiercely vocal of Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray’s hard stand on migrant workers from UP and Bihar, said, “Nearly a dozen Azamgarh residents working in Southwest Asian countries too are coming to back the SP candidates in Maharashtra.

Azmi and SP’s main electorate are people from UP who have now settled in Maharasthra, including backward classes and Muslims. Azmi had earlier announced the SP will contest 23 seats in the coming assembly polls.

Azmi had taken his oath in Hindi despite MNS chief’s warning to all MLAs not to take oath in any language other than Marathi and was manhandled by an MNS MLA.

The ‘Azamgarh team’ is scheduled to reach Maharashtra by October 3 and camp there till October 15 —the polling day.