Yadav family feud: Will Mulayam take a new, big step today?

The protracted Yadav family feud might just take a new turn on Monday with the founder president of the Samajwadi Party (SP) Mulayam Singh Yadav likely to announce, what the party circle is touting as “something big” at a press conference in Lucknow.

Mulayam’s brother and SP MLA Shivpal Singh Yadav and Lok Dal president Sunil Singh too are expected to attend the conference.

Since Sunil Singh too has been invited, speculation is rife that Mulayam might announce a new party or take over the Lok Dal.

“There is certainly something drastic coming up,” said a Lohia Trust member. The trust is an affiliate of the SP and Mulayam is its chairperson.

Sunil Singh, who had been insisting that Mulayam should take over the Lok Dal, also said on Sunday: “Netaji’s party will be the real Samajwadi Party.”

The power struggle within the SP, has split the Yadav family with the patriarch Mulayam siding with his brother Shivpal much to the chagrin of his son Akhilesh.

The feud came into the fore in August last year. On January 1 this year, an emergency session of the party announced Akhilesh Yadav as the national president replacing Mulayam.

The renewed tension between the two rival groups in the family and the party came to surface once again when the Shivpal was not invited to the 8th state convention of the SP on Saturday.

Shivpal claimed the party did not ask him or Mulayam to attend the conference.

Just a day ahead of the state convention, Mulayam had sacked the SP national general secretary Ramgopal Yadav, a loyalist of Akhilesh Yadav from the post of secretary of the trust and gave the position to Shivpal.

For the Saturday’s convention, the SP did put up some hoardings with Mulayam’s pictures on them but Shivpal’s name or picture was nowhere to be seen.

Though Akhilesh did mention Mulayam in his speech, he made a scathing attack on Shivpal and his camp. All the top senior leaders, including Ramgopal, Azam Khan, Naresh Agrawal, too joined the chorus in attacking Shivpal.

Another source said: “It might not be a new party yet, and perhaps Mulayam had called the press conference to oust Akhilesh Yadav and a few more SP leaders from Lohia Trust. All these leaders, including Ramgopal and Akhilesh, were invited to attend meetings of the trust, but none of them attended any of them.”

Prior to axing Ramgopal two day ago, Mulayam last month had sacked five senior SP leaders from the trust’s membership.