Hyderabad: The Hyderabad parliamentary seat has been the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM)’s bastion for decades; it won the seat ten consecutive times starting 1984.For decades, the result seemed a foregone conclusion in AIMIM’s favour.However, this time around, incumbent MP Asaduddin Owaisi is facing quite a challenger in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s Kompella Madhavi Latha, whose visible and communally charged speeches and campaign have won her social media and national media attention.While Latha vows to dislodge Owaisi from his home turf, the AIMIM chief is confident of securing his record fifth term in parliament.Illustration: Pariplab ChakrabortyLatha, who is making her political debut, calls herself a cultural activist and crusader of sanatana dharma. She is the chairperson of the well-known Virinchi Hospitals in Hyderabad.As the campaign reached its final leg, the Hyderabad MP was seen walking through the lanes and by-lanes of the constituency – much of which is known locally as the ‘Old City’ – with a microphone in his hand and his supporters in tow underlining one simple message:“Hyderabad ke aman ko mazboot kariye, yeh aapke buzurgon ki qurbaniyon ka nateeja hai. Patang ke nishan par vote daaliye, ek ek vote ka istamaal kariye [Strengthen the peace in Hyderabad, which is the fruit of the sacrifices of your ancestors. Vote for the AIMIM’s kite symbol. Use every vote],” he said.Latha’s high-decibel campaign has been markedly different. Standing atop an open-top jeep with campaign songs blaring, Latha appeals to Hyderabadi voters with speeches loaded with communal slurs and anti-Muslim hate.“You might think it is just one seat. But you don’t understand the importance of this Hyderabad seat. If you can defeat him [Owaisi] in his own backyard, he will have nowhere to go. He has to find his place in Pakistan or Afghanistan,” said Latha in the Gowlipura neighbourhood of the Old City.She has also styled her campaign as being for ‘Bhagyanagar’, which is the name some in the Hindu right prefer for Hyderabad.Local BJP leaders have spoken of renaming Hyderabad to Bhagyanagar and Prime Minister Narendra Modi also referred to the city by this name in a speech two years ago.Owaisi leading a ‘paidal daura’ or on-foot canvassing campaign in Hyderabad’s Yakutpura. Photo: The Wire.Electoral discourse takes a Hindu-Muslim turnWith the election to the Hyderabad parliament seat taking a Hindu-Muslim turn, people’s issues and development concerns have taken a back seat. Both contestants have drawn criticism for raking up communal issues.For instance, in a viral video, Latha is seen pretending to shoot an imaginary arrow purportedly directed at a mosque during a procession on Ram Navami.Owaisi was quick to hit back. “People of Hyderabad had seen the BJP’s intentions. They will not accept the BJP-RSS’s vulgar and provocative actions. Is this the ‘Viksit Bharat’ the BJP is talking about?” he said.“Bigger than elections is the peace of Hyderabad. I am confident that the people of Telangana will vote against the BJP, who are against peace in the state.”He went on to say the “imaginary shooting of an arrow” was not only aimed at the place of worship but at the peace and tranquillity of Hyderabad.Latha did issue an apology later, but Hyderabad’s Begumbazar police station registered a first information report (FIR) against her.“It has come to my notice that a video of mine is being circulated in the media to create negativity. I would like to clarify that it’s an incomplete video and even because of such a video, if anyone’s sentiments are hurt, then I would like to apologise as I respect all individuals,” she said in a post on X (formerly Twitter).In another viral video, Owaisi is seen praising a beef shop owner, which the BJP called “indecent and controversial”. The video shows Owaisi passing by a beef shop and saying, “Rehan beef shop zindabad … Kaat te raho [keep slaughtering].”Madhavi Latha (standing atop the pickup truck and wearing a shawl)’s high-decibel campaign has been markedly different from Owaisi’s. Photo: The Wire.Taking exception to this, Latha said: “I don’t understand how Asaduddin Owaisi became a barrister. He keeps talking about personal law. According to personal law, a ‘fatwa’ is something that is to be obeyed by all … When there is a fatwa that beef should not be consumed, then how is he going against the fatwa? This means he does not respect his own religion…“Is the life of a Muslim so small that it revolved around cutting and consuming beef? You are asking for votes on this? … Why is he making the lives of Muslims so small? … He should speak of getting an education and being something for the country … What does it mean to cut beef? Did he not get anything else to ask for votes [on]? … It is a matter of surprise for me…”Even Union minister Nirmala Sitharaman weighed in on Owaisi’s comments, calling them “indecent” and characteristic of his penchant for controversy.Meanwhile, the Congress has fielded its district president Mohammed Sameer Waliullah, who says both the AIMIM and the BJP are playing communal politics.He has urged voters to choose the region’s welfare and development.Voters in this high-profile constituency will decide their candidates’ fate on May 13, when they will vote alongside the rest of Telangana as well as with Andhra Pradesh.Retaining Hyderabad for the AIMIM means securing its bastion, given that six of the constituency’s seven assembly segments are held by its own legislators, which they won in the November 2023 assembly elections.On the other hand, the BJP has only one MLA in the seat in the form of controversial leader T. Raja Singh, who represents the Goshamahal assembly constituency.Interview | Secret Pact Between BRS and BJP, Says Telangana Senior Congress Leader‘Bogus’ votingIn the run-up to this election, the Congress and the BJP have alleged that there are ‘bogus’ voters in Hyderabad’s electoral roll.They allege that some people are registered to vote in more than one constituency, that some deceased people appear in the roll as eligible voters, or that implausible numbers of voters are listed as living in small homes or on vacant land.In February, Congress leader Feroz Khan claimed that 6.64 lakh of Hyderabad’s 22,06,654 registered votes – close to a third of the total – were duplicate or otherwise invalid.He alleged that the AIMIM depends on these ‘bogus’ votes to stay in power.“There is a problem in the system here. Why does the AIMIM contest only in Hyderabad and not from Secunderabad? Why doesn’t it contest from Jubilee Hills, Musheerabad, Bodhan, Warangal or Mahabubnagar? There is a [sizeable] number of Muslims [in these seats],” Khan said at a press conference.He added that the AIMIM’s leadership “rests only on stolen votes and on bogus votes”.Khan has brought up the alleged presence of bogus voters ahead of the 2018 and 2023 assembly elections as well.In an interview to ANI, Latha said that bogus voting would “100%” take place in Hyderabad and alleged that those in charge of checking voter details at polling booths in the constituency are complicit in “rigging” and enabling bogus voting.When asked what her party’s polling agents would do in the face of such ‘rigging’, Latha said they were at risk of facing violence and implied that this was a major reason why the BJP has only one assembly seat in the Hyderabad parliamentary constituency.Both Khan and Latha have pointed fingers at the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation for not doing enough to combat these ‘bogus’ votes.The local Majlis Bachao Tehreek party has also accused the AIMIM of benefitting from bogus votes, but has stepped out of the fray this time citing the interests of the Muslim community. Photo: MBT’s Facebook page.Khan has reportedly said that the corporation wasn’t doing enough to delete such votes under “pressure [from] local ruling political parties”, while Latha has accused it of being ‘hand-in-glove’ with Telangana’s Congress government and ‘working in tandem with’ the AIMIM.In April, election officials announced that 5.41 lakh names had been deleted from the voter rolls of the Hyderabad district – the Hyderabad parliamentary seat is part of this district – and The Hindu reported that 1.67 lakh deletions (31%) took place after the assembly elections in November.According to the Times of India, four of the top seven assembly constituencies in terms of voter deletions – Chandrayangutta, Yakutpura, Malakpet and Bahadurpura – were from the Hyderabad parliamentary constituency.Although Madhavi Latha alleged that Hyderabad’s municipal corporation did not delete these votes soon enough, she also said while speaking to The Print that she would wait and see whether “bogus” votes or “Hindu” votes had been deleted.Owaisi has denied having any role in the presence of bogus votes in Hyderabad.MBT withdraws from pollsAnother local party, the Majlis Bachao Tehreek (MBT), has also been involved in alleging that the AIMIM benefits from bogus votes.In the assembly elections from the Yakutpura seat, MBT candidate and party spokesperson Amjed Ullah Khan lost to the AIMIM by a thin margin of 878 votes.The two parties otherwise have a history of rivalry too, and there was one incident in 2011 where AIMIM leader and Asaduddin Owaisi’s brother Akbaruddin Owaisi was shot by a man he claimed was an MBT member.For the coming election, Amjed Ullah was reportedly set to contest from Hyderabad, but his party dropped out of the race at the last minute citing the interests of the Muslim community.“We did not want to split the Muslim votes, that is why we are not contesting,” Amjed Ullah told The News Minute, saying the MBT’s decision was also prompted by calls from local religious leaders.Party head Majeed Ullah Khan was also reported as saying that a loss for the BJP would count as a victory for the MBT.