SP chief meets Beni Prasad Varma to prevent exodus

Lucknow: Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav is now warming up to senior SP leaders to check their flight to uncle Shivpal Yadav’s Samajwadi Secular Morcha.

Mr Yadav, on Sunday, paid an unpublicised visit to Rajya Sabha MP Beni Prasad Varma and spent over an hour with him.

Mr Varma said on Monday that the visit was a 'good initiative' by Mr Akhilesh Yadav though it did not have any specific purpose.

 “After a long time, I met Akhilesh and we discussed the political scenario at length and also the upcoming Lok Sabha polls,” Mr Varma said.

Sources said that the two leaders also discussed ways to counter the Samajadwai Secular Morcha which was weaning away leaders from the Samajwadi Party.

Akhilesh, however, seemed very confident of his party's alliance with Bahujan Samaj Party for the 2019 elections.

“Akhilesh said that he had two rounds of talks with the BSP leadership and there were no issues about seat sharing because SP would not jeopardize the alliance because of this,” a source said.

Mr Varma is an old associate of Mulayam Singh Yadav and also one of the founding members of the Samajwadi Party. He had earlier joined the Congress but returned to SP on the insistence of Mulayam.

After the change of guard in SP in 2017, Mr Varma was reportedly sidelined and had even stopped visiting the party office. However, the sources said that he continued to make efforts to resolve the Yadav family war but failed.

Mr Varma is a prominent Kurmi leader in Uttar Pradesh.