We are family: In UP, Mulayam picks his other Yadav heir

Lucknow: For the Samajwadi Party, it is family first – whether in the party or in the government. Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav has once again made that clear by announcing the name of nephew Tej Pratap Singh Yadav as the SP candidate for the by-election to the Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat. This virtually puts to rest all speculation that Mulayam may replace Akhilesh as chief minister with a face from outside the family.

It had been speculated for some time that the SP chief might go in for a change in Mainpuri beyond the family, along with the wild thought that a change in leadership in the government, too, could be considered. The latter speculation had arisen after the results of the Assembly by-election in Uttarakhand came in, where all the three seats were won by the Congress under Harish Rawat’s chief ministership after it removed Vijay Bahuguna who had earned the reputation of being ineffective.

Names of senior minister Azam Khan or Ram Gopal or Ram Gopal Yadav as candidates from Mainpuri were making the rounds. “Ideally they should have done this, but it appears that the SP leadership just cannot think beyond the family. With the Mainpuri announcement, all such possibilities have been put to rest," says Prof Dilip Agnihotri, a political science professor in a Lucknow University college.

Another point he mentioned was that the SP leadership could think of none else in case a change in government leadership was effected. “Even in Mainpuri, the name making the rounds was that of SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav – again from the same family. For chief ministership, in that case, there is no one else whom the SP leadership can trust,” he says.

After the violent disturbances in Kaanth, Moradabad and Hapur the SP government should have gone in for some drastic measures but that that does not seem possible now, Agnihotri feels.

State BJP spokesman Vijay Bahadur Pathak says that the chief minister has failed to get a grip over governance and law and order in the state but it was futile to expect that the SP leadership will even think about changing the leader. “It is more of a family party and its leadership does not appear capable of even thinking about a change,” he feels.

He conceded that the UP BJP had taken serious cognizance of the defeat of party candidates in Uttarakhand but added that the party had been much more active in UP than in the hill state. “We took to the streets immediately after the Lok Sabha election and now only we are in the reckoning versus the Samajwadi Party for the coming by-elections,” Pathak says. The BJP will win all the seats going for by-polls, he says confidently.

A meeting has been called in the state BJP office on Monday in which state BJP president Laxmikant Bajpai, organization secretary Sunil Bansal and some others have been summoned.

The Congress, however, views the situation in an entirely different context. “It is the prestige of the BJP that is at stake rather than that of the chief minister,” says Devendra Pratap Singh, secretary and spokesman of the Uttar Pradesh Congress committee. “If the party loses all or most of the seats, it will be a loss of face for the party at the national level in view of the hype that the party has created in the state," Singh says.

“I do not think any change in leadership of the SP government is possible as it would mean bringing the political career of the present chief minister to an effective end,” says Singh. “Mulayam Singh Yadav would never do that, even though the popular belief would be that the present government has failed on all fronts. But the Akhilesh Yadav government still has a chance to improve things,” he says.

As for the coming by-elections, Singh believes that the BJP will fare poorly and may not win even one seat despite the SP government’s performance.

He agrees with what the Uttarakhand Congress leaders are saying about the hill state’s verdict heralding a comeback for the Congress. Harish Rawat had taken over on February 1 and although the change did not help the Congress win any seat in Lok Sabha election in May, the party won all the three Assembly seats - Doiwala, Dharchula and Someshwar - in the July 21 by-election. Harish Rawat himself won from Dharchula, whereas the BJP could not even retain Doiwala, considered a BJP stronghold for decades and represented by former BJP Chief Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal.

While none in Samajwadi Party was willing to talk on this subject on the pretext of being pre-occupied with the Saharanpur disturbances, leaders say the Uttarakhand verdict was an indication that the BJP wave was on the wane. Instead, the talk in the SP is now on how cleverly Mulayam Singh Yadav has taken early lead over other parties by announcing candidates for all the seats going to by-elections.

Mulayam has approved the name of nephew Tej Pratap Yadav to contest from Mainpuri, which Mulayam had vacated after winning from here and Azamgarh. The decision has strengthened the belief that the SP chief is not willing to delegate charge of his Lok Sabha constituency to anyone outside the family.

At present, four members of the Yadav family represent the SP in parliament: Mulayam Singh from Azamgarh, daughter-in-law Dimple from Kannauj and nephews Dharmendra and Akshay, from Badaun and Firozabad, respectively.

The 25-year-old Tej Pratap is a management graduate and son of Mulayam’s deceased nephew Ranveer Singh. He had been a block pramukh in Saifai and has also been managing the family’s annual Saifai Mahotsav. In the 2013 Saifai Mahotsav Mulayam had formally introduced Tej Pratap to the audience and before that in 2012 Tej Pratap had been involved in the party’s campaign in Etawah and Mainpuri.

Party candidates for other assembly seats are Juhi Singh (Lucknow East), Kunwar Rani Ruchibira (Bijnor), Sanjay Garg (Saharanpur City), Nahid Hasan (Kairana), Nawab Jaan Khan (Thakurdwara, Moradabad), Shabbir Balmiki (Balha, Bahraich) and Shivcharan Prajapati (Hamirpur). Other seats where by-elections are to be held are Gautam Buddh Nagar or Noida, Nighasan, Charkhari, Sirathu and Rohaniya.