Lucknow, Nov 29 (IANS): As the countdown to the by-elections to two Assembly and one Lok Sabha seat begins, the barbs being thrown between the political leaders are getting sharper by the day.

Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya has now called Samajwadi leader Mohd Azam Khan a 'riot-provoking' minister of the previous SP regime. He also accused him of unleashing terror on people of Rampur by encroaching upon their land and is now shedding crocodile tears.

Maurya said that the BJP government has done the work of ending the terror of Azam Khan. He recalled that a stampede that occurred at the Kumbh mela was organised during the SP regime.

"Khan was the urban development minister then and he was sleeping in his bungalow," he remarked.

Maurya's attack on Khan came after the latter accused the Rampur police and the administration of threatening his supporters and even his family members.

"Azam Khan is accusing the police. Under the BJP rule the police and the administration work in a fair manner. Now, the police are not afraid of miscreants, rather miscreants are afraid of the police," he said.

The deputy chief minister also accused Azam Khan of trying to turn Rampur into his "fiefdom".

"But now people of Rampur will teach him a lesson in the same way as they taught him a lesson in the recent Lok Sabha byelection (BJP candidate Ghanshyam Singh Lodhi had won Rampur Lok Sabha bypolls)," he said.