From Azam Khan To Shivpal, SP Veterans Driving Hard Bargain With Akhilesh Yadav In First Election Post Mulayam's Demise

Samajwadi Party (SP) has again changed its candidate from Budaun for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. It has now replaced Akhilesh Yadav's uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav with the latter's son Aditya Yadav.

Earlier, in its first list released in January, the SP had given the Badaun ticket to Akhilesh's cousin Dharmendra Yadav, who was elected from Budaun in 2009 and 2014 and was the runner-up in 2019.

Badaun sent Sanghamitra Maurya to the Lok Sabha in the last election. She is the daughter of former SP leader, Swami Prasad Maurya. Both father and daughter were then in Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

A month later in February, the ticket was given to Shivpal Yadav. While he was happy to receive the ticket that time, he reportedly started lobbying for his son's electoral debut soon after, expressing reluctance to contest himself.

Earlier in March, he had said, "This seat has been a stronghold of the Samajwadi Party. Earlier, Netaji (Mulayam Singh Yadav) was the MP from here, then Professor Ram Gopal, then Dharmendra (Yadav) and now I am here to contest."

However, in April, he said, "Wherever we went and held meetings, public has made the demand that it needs a youth candidate," suggesting that Aditya Yadav might get a ticket. In public though, he said that he had left the decision to the party leadership.

It is now reported by Amar Ujala that SP president Akhilesh Yadav has approved the candidate change and Aditya Yadav will indeed be the party's candidate from Badaun. SP's chief spokesperson Rajendra Chuadhary has confirmed this development.

It is believed that it was Shivpal's well-planned strategy to get a ticket for his son. When he himself got the ticket, he took Aditya for campaigning along with him and attempted to create a narrative in the latter's favour.

Reportedly, Shivpal does not want to contest himself because he does not want to leave state politics for Parliament and would rather establish his son in electoral politics in the current election.

After a month of campaigning, Shivpal managed to get a resolution passed by SP workers in Gunnaur last week to favour Aditya as the party candidate. Aditya even started campaigning for himself.

On Sunday (7 April), Shivpal declared Aditya as the SP candidate at an event in Bisauli Assembly segment. However, official announcement was delayed to avoid charges of dynastic politics.

Despite this, the SP workers are reportedly seeking votes in Aditya's name on the ground since Shivpal's announcement. Former Bilsi MLA Radha Krishna Sharma said on Monday that Aditya will be their voice in Parliament.

Political observers say that Akhilesh Yadav has made the compromise to keep his family together. Notably, Shivpal Yadav had left the party on one occassion to form his Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (PSP).

While the PSP merged into SP after the death of party founder Mulayam Singh Yadav, accommodating Shivpal has been a challenge for Akhilesh ever since.

Not only Shivpal, other veteran leaders like the jailed Azam Khan, has too managed to pressurise Akhilesh after Mulayam Yadav's death. The latest example was seen in Moradabad candidate selection.

Sitting Moradabad MP S T Hasan was the declared SP candidate and even filed his nomination papers. However, a day later, another SP candidate Ruchi Veera, who got a ticket on Azam Khan's insistence, filed her papers.

This led to cancellation of Hasan's candidature, who is now boycotting these elections along with his supporters. Thus, under Khan's pressure, Akhilesh Yadav was forced to take a decision that effectively sabotaged the chances of his party in Moradabad, one of the only five seats it won in the 2019 elections.

The situation for SP is more grim in Badaun as the party had already lost this seat to the BJP in 2019 and its current candidate is seen as lacking in political experience, except for heading some cooperatives.

Another veteran SP leader, Revati Raman Singh has too expressed displeasure over Akhilesh's leadership after his son Ujjwal Raman Singh was removed from the post of party general secretary and not given a Rajya Sabha ticket.

Earlier, this month Ujjwal joined Congress and is all set to contest Lok Sabha elections from his father's legacy seat Prayagraj. This came after the Prayagraj seat fell under Congress' quota under INDI Alliance agreement.

Thus, while SP will be supporting Ujjwal's candidature in Prayagraj, the party lost its former MLA to Congress. Ujjwal has been elected as an MLA from Prayagraj's Karachhana twice, in 2004 and 2017.