Akhilesh made Leader of Oppn: ‘Our goal is to fight for issues of people’

Earlier in the day, he was elected leader of the SP legislature party at a meeting of the party legislators in Lucknow.

The SP is the largest Opposition party in the 403-member Assembly with 111 MLAs. With six MLAs of Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party and eight MLAs of the Rashtriya Lok Dal, the SP-led alliance has 125 seats.

“Akhilesh Yadav, a member of the UP Legislative Assembly and leader of Samajwadi Party is appointed Leader of Opposition… under Section 1(h) of the Uttar Pradesh State Legislature (Members Emoluments and Pension) Act 1980,” Principal Secretary (Uttar Pradesh Vidhan Sabha Secretariat) Pradeep Dubey said.

With this, the state is set to have a former chief minister as Leader of Opposition in the Assembly. The last time, a former chief minister was appointed Leader of Opposition was Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akhilesh’s father, in 2007.

“We are taking the pledge that the goal of the Samajwadi Party’s ‘111’ is to fight for the issues of people,” he tweeted in Hindi.

Akhilesh had won from Karhal constituency in Mainpuri district in the recently concluded Assembly elections in the state. He had defeated Union minister and BJP leader SP Baghel by over 60,000 votes. On Tuesday, he had resigned as Azamgarh MP.

After he was elected leader of the SP legislature party, party’s state unit president Naresh Uttam Patel said: “His (Akhilesh Yadav’s) name was proposed by senior party MLA Awadhesh Prasad and seconded by all the elected MLAs. The MLAs have given their blessings to Akhilesh ji to raise the issues faced by the people in the Assembly. He will oppose the wrong policies of the government as per the democratic process. In the past, the BJP cheated the people of the state, and hence, it has been given fewer seats as compared to 2017.”

“People have shown confidence in Akhilesh ji, and had even voted to make him the chief minister. But, due to the misuse of power by the BJP many voters were left out. The names of SP supporters were removed from voters’ lists in all Assembly constituencies,” said Patel.

The meeting, meanwhile, brought to fore the differences between Akhilesh and his uncle Shivpal Singh Yadav.

“Though I am an MLA from SP, I was not invited to the meeting. I tried to contact SP leaders but I have not got any information about it. Under these circumstances, it will not be correct for me to go to the legislature party meeting. I have always said that I will fulfil whatever responsibility I am given,” said Shivpal.

After being at loggerheads since 2017, the uncle-nephew duo had decided to bury their differences ahead of the Assembly elections. Shivpal, who had formed a new party — Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia) — after quitting the SP in 2017, won from his traditional Jaswant Nagar seat in Etawah on an SP ticket this time.

Shivpal said he would consult leaders of the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia) and Samajwadi Party on the future course of action. “I will talk to my supporters,” said Shivpal, who was among the star campaigners for the SP in the last phase of the UP polls in eastern UP.

Asked about Shivpal’s absence in the meeting, Patel said, “Only SP MLAs were called for today’s meeting. On March 28, a meeting of MLAs of the alliance partners, irrespective of whether they had contested on ‘bicycle’ (SP symbol) or their party symbols, will be held. Allies like Pallavi Patel (Apna Dal-K), Om Prakash Rajbhar (SBSP), or even RLD and Janwadi Party’s will be called on Sunday and Akhilesh ji will interact with them.”

An SP MLA, who was part of the meeting and who wished not to be named, said that at the meeting, they were told to start working for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.