Uttar Pradesh: Akhilesh Yadav sensed Samajwadi Party split in October

NEW DELHI: The putsch in the Samajwadi Party (SP) was the result of a plan of action set in motion by chief minister Akhilesh Yadav and his team as the earliest signs of a split emerged in late October. When his father and SP founder Mulayam Singh Yadav approached the Election Commission on Jan 3 for the party symbol, Akhilesh had a lot of ammo in his legal arsenal and he had been keeping his powder dry.

Addressing a press conference on Nov 14, Ram Gopal had demanded rescinding Shivpal Yadav’s unilateral expulsion of Akhilesh’s core team of youth leaders from the party as well as granting the chief minister the final say in the ticket distribution apart from formal projection of his CM candidature. Failing which, Ram Gopal had demanded a special convention of the party. It was this demand that set the stage for the legal battle.

The old guard of the SP, the Mulayam-Shivpal-Amar Singh trio seems to have missed that public signal of an impending legal battle completely.

Between Oct 24 and Nov14 press conference, sources confide, Akhilesh-Ram Gopal faction had secured enough number of written requests to satisfy party constitution to call for an emergency convention of the party. Akhilesh-Ram Gopal further leveraged the time to rope in maximum possible delegates to bolster their case.

Even as the expulsion and revocation of expulsion kept the party cadres hooked, the Jan 1 emergency national convention of the party was used by Ram Gopal Yadav to secure signatures of party MLAs as well as delegates available at the venue at Janeshwar Mishra Park to bolster their case.

It helped when Mulayam approached Election Commission on Jan 3. Ram Gopal Yadav was armed with his affidavit that contained the signatures of party MLAs and delegates collected on Jan 1.

However, when Mulayam-Shivpal-Amar faction alleged forged signatures, Ram Gopal Yadav used his years of knowledge as SP think-tank to turn the tables. He culled out district and assembly-wise information of individual SP delegates who had re-elected Mulayam Singh as party president on October 10, 2014.

This district-wise delegate information was passed on to respective MLAs of the area to secure individual affidavits of party delegates. This meticulous preparation meant that Akhilesh camp did not need much time to gather individual affidavits to rubbish the rival camps allegation before the EC.

As for legal case, sources said confide, Akhilesh camp roped in senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Rajeev Dhawan when their first port of call, constitutional expert senior advocate PP Rao declined the case. In Sibal received his briefing on the previous night of the hearing on Jan 13 and demolished the rival camp’s case securing Akhilesh Yadav the right to use SP’s Bicycle symbol for the forthcoming UP elections.