Immediately after he won the war for Samajwadi Party, Akhilesh Yadav walked into 5, Kalidas Marg, along with his Lok Sabha MP wife Dimple Yadav, to meet his father Mulayam Yadav. While what transpired in their conversation is not known, it was in line with the image that Akhilesh had kept up all through the months of the bitter war: that of an obedient son who sincerely felt his father was being misled by “outsiders”.
Soon, Mulayam returned the compliment by congratulating Akhilesh.Also Read: SP Symbol Row: How Akhilesh Yadav Got the Cycle Symbol
Incidentally, only a few hours ago, while addressing party workers in Lucknow, Mulayam had thrown the ultimate challenge that he will contest against Akhilesh if need be. “He (Akhilesh) is hobnobbing with BJP and our other rivals. We will contest polls, we will seek people’s help against Akhilesh. I tried to convince him but he is not realizing his mistakes,” Mulayam had said.Also Read: Akhilesh Hobnobbing with BJP, Has Turned Muslims Against SP: Mulayam
Their contention is that Mulayam was getting increasingly wary of his brother Shivpal Yadav’s political ambitions and had decided to settle things once and for all in the party. Now with Akhilesh emerging organically as the undisputed leader of SP, his image as a forward-looking young leader breaking the shackles of old satraps, the present and the future of SP is settled for once and all.
The argument that its proponents throw in to buttress their theory lies in the last few paras of the official Election Commission notification handing over the ‘Cycle’ symbol to Akhilesh.
“Except for the above vague allegation Shri Mulayam Singh Yadav group despite repeated opportunities given it to it as above, neither filed any affidavit from any member nor indicated even the name of one member whose affidavit was considered by him to be suspect, or questioned the above numbers claimed by Shri Ram Gopal Yadav either on 13th January, 2017 at the time of hearing or at any time thereafter.
At the hearing, the learned counsel for his group wanted to make a mountain of a mole hill by referring to the typographical mistake of the word 'help' instead of the word 'held' in some of the affidavits filed by the other groups. But he had no answer when a more glaring mistake was pointed out to him by the learned counsel for the other group in the letter dated 3rd January, 2017 of Shri Amar Singh where he had stated in the concluding para that ‘I refute my point on the illegibility of January 01, 2017 convention of Samajwadi Party and unconstitutionality of the resolution passed thereby.”
Did Amar Singh really meant “refute”, in which case, there is no argument left because it would mean the Mulayam faction had no issue whatsoever with the January 1 convention where Akhilesh captured the party. Or was it a typo as the EC seems to be hinting?The Mulayam faction has indicated they will go to court challenging the EC order, but we may not have heard the last of the out-of-court twists in this intriguing family soap opera.