Agra The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has thrown a surprise by giving tickets to 19 Muslim corporator candidates in Aligarh in a move that some called ‘strategic’ made for political gains.

Aligarh Municipal Corporation, which has 90 wards, will go to polls in the second phase of urban local body elections on May 11. In the last civic elections in 2017, the BJP lost the Aligarh mayor seat to Bahujan Samaj Party’s Mohammad Furqan.

“We have given tickets to 19 Muslim candidates this time for corporator elections to be held in the 90 wards in Aligarh. People from the Muslim community are fast realising that it is only the BJP that cares for all without any discrimination. All deserving beneficiaries are getting houses, gas connections, Ayushman cards and ration under the various welfare schemes of the Centre and the state,” said Vivek Saraswat, the city unit president of the BJP in Aligarh.

“Before, we never had applicants from the Muslim community prepared to contest on a BJP ticket, but things have changed now. Every ward had multiple aspirants from the community,” Saraswat, who believes that the party’s stand against ‘triple talaq’ was praised by many Muslims, added.

Prof Rahat Abrar, a political analyst, however, felt that the move was more of a ‘strategy’ made for political gains instead of being the changing equations between the party and Muslims.

Rahat, who retired as the director of the Urdu Academy, Aligarh Muslim University, observed that the BJP gave tickets to Muslim candidates from wards that were dominated by minority voters. “The BJP stands no chance there. So it wants to increase its base there,” he said.

“It is totally a political plan meant to break ground in Muslim-dominated areas. This may also affect the mayor election, which the BJP had lost in 2017,” stated Prof Abrar.

While the Samajwadi Party and the BSP have fielded Muslim candidates for the mayor post, the BJP has nominated a not-so-politically-known figure in its bid to reclaim the post that it had never lost till 2017.

Weeks ago, the BJP named Prof Tariq Mansoor, the V-C of Aligarh Muslim University, as its candidate for the MLC seat from the region.