Symbol war: Cycle goes to Akhilesh, Mulayam to fight son

New Delhi: Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav scored a major political victory over his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav, with the Election Commission on Monday allotting the party’s bicycle symbol to him, and recognising his faction as the “real” Samajwadi Party.

Akhilesh Yadav, 43, now officially replaces Mulayam Singh Yadav, 77, as the national president of the party.

“The group led by Akhilesh Yadav is the Samajwadi Party and is entitled to use the name and its reserved symbol bicycle for the purposes of the election symbol,” the EC said in its 42-page order.

The shift of power from the old to the new was swift, but respectful. Minutes after the EC order, a shiny, new nameplate announcing “Akhilesh Yadav, National President” was nailed at the SP office in Lucknow, below the nameplate carrying Mulayam Singh Yadav’s name and his designation, “Rashtriya Adhyaksh”.

The Mulayam faction has threatened to move court against the EC’s decision.

Ram Gopal Yadav, Akhilesh’s uncle, close aide and the architect of the political coup, flushed with triumph, said that the EC took the “right decision as they (the Mulayam camp) did not have any supporting documents to claim symbol and party name.” “The chief minister is very happy,” he added.

Ram Gopal Yadav, whom Mulayam Singh Yadav had branded as the “villain” of the piece, said that a fresh official list of candidates would be finalised by Wednesday for the first two phases, and “a grand alliance will be formed to fight elections”.

Uttar Pradesh is to vote in a seven-phase election for its 403 seats starting February 11.

The Election Commission’s decision dealt a severe blow not merely to the SP patriarch, but also dashed the BJP’s hope of splitting the Muslim-Yadav vote.

With the secular grand alliance — comprising SP, Congress, Rashtriya Lok Dal, JD(U) and other smaller parties — now becoming a reality, Akhilesh Yadav could have an edge in the UP elections.
 
Majority of the 20 per cent Muslim vote and the Yadav votebank in the state could now consolidate in favour of Akhilesh Yadav and the grand alliance. And the RLD’s presence in the alliance guarantees a major chunk of Jat votes from western UP, which had tilted towards the BJP during the last Lok Sabha polls.
 
In this high-stake election, the BJP was hoping that the Muslim vote would split between the SP, the BSP and the Congress, and the Yadavs between the Mulayam and Akhilesh factions.
 
Akhilesh Yadav’s victory could also have an adverse impact on BSP supremo Mayawati’s attempts to return to power in Uttar Pradesh.

The Congress described the EC’s decision as “judicious” and “congratulated” Akhilesh Yadav on being allotted the cycle symbol.
 
As soon as EC announced its decision around 6.30 Monday evening, celebrations broke out in Lucknow and across Uttar Pradesh. Hundreds of youths carrying SP flags and Akhilesh Yadav’s cutouts poured out on the streets raising slogans, “Akhilesh Yadav zindabad.”

Earlier in the day, sensing that the poll panel’s decision could go against him, the angry father huffed, puffed and even threatened to contest against his son — “if need be”.
 
Nervous that his title of “messiah of the Muslims” was slipping away, Mulayam Singh Yadav, in a bid to brand Akhilesh as “anti-Muslim,” claimed that the candidate list submitted to him by his son “did not have a single Muslim name.”

Ram Gopal Yadav later made it clear that a fresh list of candidates, being drawn up by the party, will have a good number of Muslim candidates.
 
While a defeated Mulayam threatened to go to court against the EC decision, his close aide Amar Singh, who had emerged as the epicentre of the family feud in SP, was in London. His departure for London a day before the EC’s order was being viewed by some political observers as the proverbial “rat deserting a sinking ship.”

For Mulayam Singh Yadav, the poll panel’s decision could well mean the beginning of his political sunset. After scoring a hard-fought political victory, Akhilesh Yadav went to meet his father in Lucknow and later tweeted, “Cycle chalti jayegi, aage badhti jayegi”.