Speculation over fresh rift between Shivpal and Akhilesh
Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia (PSP-L) chief Shivpal Yadav skips post-election meeting of Samajwadi Party allies called by Akhilesh at SP headquarters in Lucknow
LUCKNOW Speculation over a fresh rift between Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party-Lohia (PSP-L) chief Shivpal Yadav and Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav was rife as the former skipped the post-election meeting of Samajwadi Party allies called by the latter at the SP headquarters in Lucknow on Tuesday. Shivpal stayed in Etawah.
Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) MLA Abbas Ansari and Apna Dal (K) leader Pallavi Patel, too, did not attend the meeting. SBSP chief Om Prakash Rajbhar and leader of RLD legislature group Rajpal Baliyan attended the meeting with Akhilesh.
Speaking to the media in Bharthana (Etawah), Akhilesh’s uncle Shivpal said, “I have nothing to say on the issue. If I want to say something, I will call (the media).”
On March 26, Shivpal Yadav had expressed displeasure when he had said that despite being an SP MLA, he was not called for the meeting of SP MLAs in Lucknow. The meeting had elected Akhilesh Yadav as the SP legislature party’s leader. At the press conference held to announce Akhilesh’s unanimous election as the SP legislature party chief, party’s state president Naresh Uttam Patel had said the meeting was only of those MLAs who were members of the SP while a separate meeting of alliance partners and their MLAs, including those elected on SP ticket, would be held later.
Shivpal had allied with the SP shortly before the recently concluded UP assembly elections and contested on the SP symbol from his traditional Jaswantnagar seat in Etawah. He retained the seat.
Pallavi Patel, who defeated deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya on Sirathu seat (Kaushambi), also did not show up. But her party was represented by Apna Dal (K) national general secretary Pankaj Niranjan.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), by winning 255 of the 403 assembly seats, had retained power for a second successive term in the state while the SP bagged 111 seats and emerged as a strong opposition.
Shivpal and Akhilesh, after a nearly six-year-long rift, had joined hands again ahead of the polls. When the SP was in power in the state, uncle Shivpal and nephew Akhilesh had fallen out over the control of the party. In the power struggle, Akhilesh Yadav was eventually elected the national president of the party on January 1, 2017 – shortly before the 2017 UP assembly polls. The SP lost the polls bagging only 47 seats against its previous tally of 223 seats. Shivpal went separate ways and formed the PSP-L in the latter part of 2018.