"Take 1 hour, not scared": Asaduddin Owaisi responds to BJP's Navneet Rana's comments

NEW DELHI: Reacting to BJP leader Navneet Rana's "15-second lagenge" remark, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen leader Asaduddin Owaisi on Thursday asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to give her one hour instead of 15 seconds and asserted they are not "scared" of the BJP leader. "I tell Modi ji - give her 15 seconds. What will you do? Give her 15 seconds, give her 1 hour.

We, too, want to see if you have any humanity left in you. Who is scared? We are ready...If someone is making an open call for it, then so be it. PM is yours; RSS is yours; everything is yours. Do it. Who is stopping you? Tell us where we have to come, we will be there. Do it," Owaisi told reporters on Thursday.

Responding to Navneet Rana's remarks that the vote given to AIMIM and Congress directly goes to Pakistan, he claimed that the BJP "hate" India's pluralism and diversity. "In 2014, Narendra Modi alighted at the home of Nawaz Sharif all of a sudden...What was that? They feel all Muslims in India are Pakistanis. We have to defeat this RSS ideology. They hate India's pluralism and diversity," he added.

Invoking a provocative statement by AIMIM leader Akbaruddin Owaisi from 2013, BJP leader Navneet Rana issued a veiled warning to the Owaisi brothers in their stronghold of Hyderabad on Wednesday. To the AIMIM leader's statement that they would take them all of '15 minutes' to balance out the "Hindu-Muslim ratio" in the country, Navneet, who seeking a fresh term in the Lok Sabha from Amravati, on a BJP ticket this time; hit back at the Owaisi brothers, saying "it would take us 15 seconds if the police were removed or made to stand down".

"The younger brother says 'Remove the police for 15 minutes so that we can show them what we can do'. I want to tell the younger brother (Akbaruddin) that it might take you 15 minutes, but it will only take us 15 seconds...it will take us all of 15 seconds if we come to the forefront," Rana was heard saying in a video clip she posted on her X handle, tagging the Owaisi brothers. At a meeting in 2013, Akbaruddin warned "100 crore Hindus" that his community would show what it could do if the police were withdrawn for '15 minutes'.

Asaduddin has been the elected representative from Hyderabad since 2004. He was previously elected as an MLA twice in the erstwhile undivided Andhra Pradesh. Owaisi faces BJP leader Madhavi Latha. Voting for all 17 seats in Telangana will take place on May 13 in the fourth phase of the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.