Kochi: People's Democratic Party (PDP) chairman Abdul Nasser Madani, who is on a bail to attend the marriage of his son, criticized that the Indian Union Muslim League’s (IUML) efforts to protect the interests of the Muslim community were fraught with several slips. He also said that the one-upmanship of the parties in the community is dangerous as a whole.
In an exclusive interview with Manorama News, the PDP leader disclosed that the long years he spent in jail transformed his outlook forever. Recalling the support and guidance he received from eminent jurist V.R. Krshna Iyer, Madani said the former chief justice of India was the main force in ushering in the change in him.
Dismissing the alleged presence of Islamic State (IS), the dreaded Islamic terror outfit, in Kerala as a figment of imagination, Madani said that all kinds of spiced up stories were being in circulation over the terror outfit's Kerala outing. The PDP chairman also said that he would not dismantle his party.
Madani also urged the warring Sunni factions in Kerala to unite for the cause of the community. Their rivalry is not based on ideological differences, he said.
Madani, an accused in the 2008 Bengaluru serial blasts case, said it was Congress leaders who stood with him in his difficult times. But the PDP had to enter into an alliance with the Left Democratic Front later. Madani explained that he decided to have a truck with the left after weighing the political situation of that time.
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