Uttar Pradesh: Post-breakup, Samajwadi Party asks alliance partner to return 'gifted' SUV

LUCKNOW: Break-ups can be messy, even political ones. More so when a swanky SUV is the post-breakup exchange!
Unhappy over not being "accommodated" in the Uttar Pradesh legislative council polls, Mahan Dal walked out of its alliance with the Samajwadi Party on Wednesday. On Thursday, the SP asked its former alliance partner to return the high-end SUV that the party had provided the Mahan Dal chief, Keshav Dev Maurya, for campaigning in the 2022 assembly polls.
Mahan Dal leaders confirmed that they got a call from a former SP MLC who is known to be close to the SP chief. According to them, the ex-MLC said the SUV was a gift from Akhilesh Yadav and "must be returned now".
Mahan Dal leaders drove the SUV back to the SP headquarters on Friday and handed over the keys to the former MLC.
The SP has its own explanation.
"The SUV was given to Keshav Dev Maurya as an alliance gift and is registered in the name of the Samajwadi Party. So, it had to be taken back to rule out any possibilities of its misuse by anyone,” said a senior SP leader.
In political circles, the move is being called immature and a knee-jerk reaction by the SP chief. "It could have been settled in a better way,” said an SP veteran who is now retired from active politics.
Interestingly, at the time of forging the alliance between the two parties, senior SP leader Prof Ramgopal Yadav was all praise for Keshav Dev Maurya and went on to describe him as someone who “will steer SP chief Akhilesh’s chariot like Lord Krishna did in the Mahabharat”.
In the 2022 assembly polls, Mahan Dal candidates contested from two seats and lost both. Ever since, Mahan Dal and Keshav Dev Maurya were feeling “neglected” and finally walked out of the alliance after being denied any representation in the Council elections.
When asked about the episode, Mahan Dal chief Keshav Dev Maurya said, “In villages, when two neighbours fought, they would take back whatever was borrowed from each other. Had it been Mulayam Singh Yadav, who has gone through the grind and has a mass base, he would have handled it differently."