Mulayam may part ways with Akhilesh

After months of the bitter turf war, Samajwadi Party (SP) patron Mulayam Singh Yadav may finally part ways with his son and SP supremo Akhilesh Yadav.

According to the sources within the SP, Mulayam may make an announcement to this effect in the next few days.

Sources said that SP patron wanted to make the announcement before the forthcoming national level convention of the party at Agra on October five in which Akhilesh was likely to be re-elected as party's national president for the next five years.

Sources said that Mulayam might form a separate outfit with his younger brother and senior SP leader Shivpal Singh Yadav soon after the ongoing 'Navratri' festival.

A senior leader, close to Mulayam said that the latter could also join the Lok Dal and be made its national president. The present Lok Dal chief Sunil Singh was likely to meet Mulayam here on Monday.

''It is now clear that Akhilesh is not ready to hand over the reins of the party to Mulayam nor is he likely to accommodate Shivpal,'' said the leader close to Mulayam.

Incidentally, neither Mulayam nor Shivpal was present in Saturday's state-level meeting of the SP here. The two leaders were not invited for the national convention also.
 
The war within the SP had intensified further on Thursday when party general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav had been thrown out of Ram Manohar Lohia Trust by Mulayam and replaced by Shivpal. Ram Gopal, a close aide of Akhilesh, was the secretary of the Trust.
 
Akhilesh and Shivpal had fallen out a few months before the assembly polls in the state and the former, then the chief minister had sacked the latter from the ministry. In the subsequent days the SP infighting intensified further and Akhilesh, at a hurriedly convened National Convention of the SP, also ousted Mulayam from the post of national president and anointed himself as the national president.