Rampur: Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav on Wednesday met veteran party leader Azam Khan, who was recently released from the Sitapur jail, at his residence here.
This the first meeting between the two leaders after Khan's release from jail.
Yadav flew from Lucknow to Bareilly airport and then proceeded to Rampur on a helicopter, which landed at the Maulana Jauhar University campus helipad, officials said. Khan received Yadav at the helipad.
Ahead of the visit, Khan had told the media on Tuesday that he would meet only Yadav and no one else.
When asked about Rampur SP MP Maulana Mohibullah Nadvi, Khan had said that he did not know him and would not be meeting him.
"There is no programme. Akhilesh Yadav will meet me, and I will meet only him," Khan had said.
SP MP Nadvi was not seen with Yadav in Rampur.
There has been speculation that Khan will be joining the Bahujan Samaj Party. However, the veteran SP leader has dismissed it.
Khan, the SP founding member, had earlier stated, "We have something called character. Character does not mean whether we hold a post or not; it means people love and respect us. And we are not for sale, we have proved that."
A ten-time MLA from Rampur, Khan faces several criminal charges, including allegations of land grabbing and corruption, which he claims are politically motivated. His recent release followed the Allahabad High Court granting him bail last week in the Quality Bar land encroachment case, where his name was added during a reinvestigation nearly five years after the FIR was filed.
Yadav had earlier vowed that all "false" cases against Khan would be withdrawn once the SP comes to power in Uttar Pradesh, stating that Khan has "finally got justice." The SP currently has 37 MPs and 107 MLAs, including 34 Muslim MLAs and four Muslim MPs in the state assembly.
(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by FPJ's editorial team and auto-generated from an agency feed.)
