Mulayam, Akhilesh reach EC as fate of SP symbol hangs in balance

New Delhi: With the Election Commission all set to begin its first hearing on the dispute in the Samajwadi Party with regard to the symbol ' cycle', party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and his son and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav on Friday arrived at the office of the poll body in Lucknow to put forth their stands.

The development came as the prospect of the Election Commission freezing the Samajwadi Party’s “bicycle” symbol looms large.

Both father Mulayam Singh Yadav and son Akhilesh Yadav, who are locked in a bitter fight for the control of the party, have a Plan B ready.

While party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav intends to merge his faction with another party, Lok Dal, and use its symbol — two bullocks and a farmer tilling land, Akhilesh Yadav is likely to float his own party, the Akhil Bhartiya Samajwadi Party, with “motorcycle” as its symbol.

On Thursday, Akhilesh Yadav held a meeting with party workers and assured them that he would soon start campaigning.

On Friday, the full EC, headed by Chief Election Commissioner Nasim Zaidi, will hear both the sides and take a decision on the party symbol based on the deposition by lawyers of both the camps.

Thursday morning, Lok Dal national president Sunil Singh had a meeting with Mulayam Singh Yadav, Shivpal Yadav and Amar Singh, apparently to look at the options of a merger. The meeting, at Mulayam Singh Yadav’s New Delhi residence on Ashoka Road, was also attended by a couple of lawyers, who will represent the Mulayam faction at the EC today.

Emerging from the meeting, Amar Singh told this newspaper that though efforts were on resolve differences, “in the event of EC freezing the symbol, we are looking at the options of Mulayam faction contesting on the Lok Dal symbol.” Asked whether the Mulayam faction would be called Lok Dal, Sunil Singh said, “We are looking at all options”.

The Lok Dal website claims that the outfit was founded by former Prime Minister Charan Singh in 1980 and had all the top regional satraps. The names of the regional leaders listed by the website include Devi Lal, Mulayam Singh Yadav and Nitish Kumar, among others.

With the possibility of a patch-up between father and son getting remote with each passing day, sources said that the Uttar Pradesh chief minister has virtually made up his mind to float his own outfit, Akhil Bhartiya Samajwadi Party, with motorcycle as its symbol.

It may be called that on Tuesday Mulayam Singh Yadav met his son in Lucknow and declared that Akhilesh would be Uttar Pradesh’s chief minister if the SP won the polls.

Despite his father’s olive branch, Akhilesh Yadav has refused to step down as Samajwadi Party’s national president. Akhilesh was selected national president of the party at a convention on January 1, which Mulayam Singh Yadav declared “unconstitutional”.

The EC is expected to adhere to the precedent set during the split in Uttarakhnad Kranti Dal in 2011, sources said. The EC had frozen the symbol (chair) and had asked both factions to contest on fresh symbols.