A video has gone viral on various social media platforms showing AIMIM UP President Shaukat Ali arguing at the hotel reception in Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh. The video claims that a ‘Hindu hotel’ declined a room to the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief Asaduddin Owaisi.
Owaisi was in the city on January 4, 2022, to address a political rally ahead of the Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections.
Hotels in UP refuse to give Owaisi a room thanks to his inflammatory communal politics always threatening Hindus and almost always abusing Yogiji and Modiji. Contd.. pic.twitter.com/eLqy1TkdhA
— Sandy Boy 🇮🇳(Sundeep) (@ssingapuri) January 5, 2022
In the 2.20-minute video, AIMIM Uttar Pradesh president Shaukat Ali can be seen exchanging a heated conversation with the person sitting at the hotel reception and thereafter leaving the premises with his party members. Shaukat Ali, who looks visibly angry, speaks on the phone while leaving the premises. After a while, the AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi is seen walking into the hotel. He is seen waiting at the reception area for some time before he sits in his car and leaves the premises.
The video has been circulating with claims that the people of the likes of the AIMIM chief are being denied rooms in the ‘Hindu hotel’ in Uttar Pradesh because of their anti-Hindu stand. Many media houses like Lucknow Hindi news shared the video, which was then circulated widely on the microblogging site.
Vernacular media outlets LiveHindustan and ABP News also reported how the party members had booked the room earlier for the AIMIM members but when Owaisi arrived at the hotel named Drive-In 24 in Moradabad, the hotel authorities denied him a room.
What is the truth
The Hindustan report quoted the hotel manager Vipul as saying that according to the guidelines, they need prior approval before allotting rooms to any political figures. “We operate within the confines of the law. I am ready to give the room once I receive authorization”, said the hotel manager as per the report by Hindustan, who was quoted as further saying that the hotel does not believe in any kind of discrimination.
OpIndia spoke with a hotel employee named Arvind Singh Katheria, who claimed to have looked into the arrangements for the entire AIMIM team, which was said to have stayed in the hotel from January 4 to 6. He refuted the news that has been circulating in media that Owaisi was denied a room in the hotel. Katheria, on the contrary, confirmed that Asaduddin Owaisi was allotted a room immediately on his arrival on January 4 and had a very pleasant stay at the hotel and personally thanked the hotel staff before he checked out on January 6.
Narrating the sequence of events, Katheria said the Owaisi had arrived at the hotel and after checking in, he immediately left for a meeting. Some people who had accompanied him checked in later in the evening.
Divulging further details, the hotel staff said that as per protocols, whenever any VIP guest arrives, the LIU team needs to be informed in advance so that their security arrangements can be made.
According to him, if a member of any political party checks into a hotel, a letter must be issued in advance to the district magistrate’s office, which would then alert the hotel and make the necessary security arrangements for the team. The hotel had not received a letter from the district magistrate’s office since it had not been forwarded to them by the AIMIM team in advance.
“We were awaiting a response from the office of the district magistrate when the AIMIM state president Shaukat Ali got agitated. He demanded that the rooms be made available to them immediately. We only asked them to wait for a little. Their check-in was done before we even received the letter from the district magistrate’s office. Only some formalities were left, as it is a matter of security and we cannot take any chances.
At this point, one of the AIMIM members started spreading rumours that the hotel had denied him a room, leading to the rumour that the AIMIM chief had been denied a room in the hotel over religious discrimination.
This was a small issue that was blown out of proportion and misrepresented. Soon after, rumours circulated that Asaduddin Owaisi had been denied a room, which Arvind Singh Katheria said was “totally false and unsubstantiated.”
“He (Owaisi) was very pleased with our services and thanked the hotel employees personally before checking out today (January 6)”, Katheria added.
AIMIM supremo Asaduddin Owaisi, who has taken to the communal route to fight the upcoming state assembly elections, was on a two-day visit to Uttar Pradesh as a part of his election campaign. Interestingly, Owaisi had kickstarted his campaign for Uttar Pradesh 2022 state elections from Ayodhya claiming that the “Muslims of UP will win” and since then he has given several inflammatory speeches, instigating Muslims to choose an Islamic leader and not rely on the ‘Dallas’ of other political parties.
The Uttar Pradesh police had on September 9, registered two FIRs against the AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi in connection with his public meeting in Uttar Pradesh’s Barabanki. The Hyderabad MP had been booked on charges of attempting to disturb communal harmony, flouting Covid norms and disrespecting the national flag.
Owaisi, who is eyeing to make inroads in Uttar Pradesh by wooing the Muslim vote bank, had delivered a communally charged speech in which he, despite clarifications from authorities of the Mosque being an illegal structure, tried to provoke the Muslims by making references to the razing of a mosque in the Ram Snehi Ghat tehsil in May this year.
