Samajwadi Party’s youngest president till date, Akhilesh Yadav, now faces a tough challenge from none other than his uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav, who now heads Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia).
The chief of the fledgling PSPL demonstrated his political clout and organisational strength by organising a hugely successful rally in Lucknow on Sunday.
The rally has given a clear message that Shivpal Yadav is ready for a no holds barred battle with his nephew and Samajwadi Party and that he is not interested in returning to the SP fold.
Samajwadi Party now faces the uphill task of organising a rally in Lucknow ahead of 2019 Lok Sabha elections to match the crowd strength mobilised by the PSPL.
By adopting a strident anti-temple stance, Shivpal Yadav has added to the woes of Samajwadi Party, which had adopt a soft stance towards the Yogi Adityanath-led Bharatiya Janata Party government, issues concerning communal faultlines and mobilisations for the Ram temple construction in Ayodhya.
“By adopting the anti-temple stance, the PSPL gave out a clear message to Muslims to think about their long bonding with Samajwadi Party. That way the PSPL has succeeded in making a concerted bid to make inroads into SP’s core vote bank — Muslims,” said a former SP MP who is now with the PSPL.
By his strong anti-temple stance, Shivpal tried to fight the stigma of being in cahoots with the BJP by referring to the tough action taken by Mulayam Singh Yadav against karsewaks for protecting the Babri mosque at Ayodhya in 1990 and also the mosque demolition in 1992.
The presence of Mulayam Singh Yadav and his younger daughter-in-law Aparna Yadav at the rally immensely helped Shivpal to demonstrate that he was not alone in the family.
By publicly blessing Shivpal Yadav, Mulayam Singh Yadav indicated that he may be with his son Akhilesh but his heart also throbbed for his younger brother Shivpal. This helped Shivpal Yadav in stamping the point that he was not defying the wishes of Netaji and this is being projected as a huge success of Shivpal.
Besides, a large number of former Samajwadi Party MLAs, MPs and members from Yadav community have already shifted their allegiance to the PSPL, making a substantial dent in Yadav vote bank of the Samajwadi Party.
Presence of former Rajya Sabha MP Sukhram Singh Yadav, who is son of tall Yadav leader Harmohan Singh Yadav, gave a clear message that the Yadav clan could no longer be taken for granted by the Samajwadi Party leadership.
A PSPL leader said, “The huge turnout at the rally also sent out a clear message to the BJP that this party should not be taken for granted. Besides, Shivpal has the political acumen and clout in the state to establish PSPL as an independent political force.
“The rally demonstrated that PSPL is a broad-based mainstream political party enjoying the support of OBCs, Dalits and Muslims and other sections of society.
Shivpal faced humiliation in Samajwadi Party but he has the strength to fight back and it is impossible to write him off from the political scene of UP,” said PSPL spokesman Deepak Mishra.
The rally also has a message for the alliance of anti-BJP parties for 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Sources in PSPL claimed that Sunday’s rally demonstrated that it would not be easy for anti- BJP parties to ignore PSPL for any alternative alliance.
They claimed that the PSPL has the capacity to spoil the electoral arithmetic of anti-BJP parties if it was ignored.
