AAP's Ashutosh addressing a press conference in Delhi
Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party has rejected a vote appeal in its favour by leading Muslim cleric Syed Ahmed Bukhari, which has also led to another wordy duel between the party and its main rival, the BJP, hours before Delhi votes.
"AAP has nothing to do with Bukhari. We don't need the support of a man who did not invite India's prime minister but invited Pakistan's PM on his son's anointment. One has to respect the Prime Minister of the country," said AAP's Ashutosh.
He said AAP was "fighting to end communal politics of the kind the Imam stands for."
Syed Bukhari, who is the Shahi Imam of Delhi's Jama Masjid, had appealed this morning to Muslims voters to support AAP and "form a secular government in Delhi."
BJP leader and central minister Nirmala Sitharaman accused AAP of "politics of religion."
"They asked for support, and they got support. What does it mean to say now that they don't want support? Who is the beneficiary of the 'fatwa', it is AAP," she said.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley of the BJP said, "The correct answer to such fatwas is through the ballot."
The Delhi election is expected to be a close contest between AAP and the BJP.
In the last election, the Imam had called his supporters to vote for the Congress.
A few months ago, he had invited Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif for a ceremony to appoint his son as his successor and had said that he was not inviting Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "The host decides who to invite. And I have no place for Modi in my heart," Syed Bukhari had said.
The appointment as Imam-in-waiting of 19-year-old Shaban Ahmed Bukhari also ran into controversy, with the Wakf board challenging it in the Delhi High Court.