Shivpal hails SP victory
LUCKNOW: Samajwadi Party leader Shivpal Yadav, who is also uncle of SP president Akhilesh Yadav, on Thursday hailed the party’s victory in Gorakhpur and Phulpur Lok Sabha by-polls as “historic”.
In a tweet posted on Thursday, Shivpal said: “May this beautiful story proves a milestone”.
Without naming Akhilesh, Shivpal attributed the victory to the “able leadership of the Samajwadi Party”.
Shivpal, who has had bitter relationship with Akhilesh in the past, was on a tour to Mauritius and tweeted on his return to Lucknow, “I congratulate the people of Phulpur and Gorakhpur, the able leadership of the Samajwadi Party, its workers, and the winning candidates. With the dual sync of hard work and social justice, I wish this beautiful story proves to be a milestone”.
Shivpal’s tweet set off a fresh round of speculation that there could be a patch-up move between the uncle and his nephew and that he could vote for the Rajya Sabha candidates of the Samajwadi Party (BSP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) on March 23.
Shivpal’s loyalties have been a matter of speculation since his camp members paved way for the election of chief minister Yogi Adityanath and deputy chief minister Keshav Maurya and others to the Vidhan Parishad.
The Shivpal camp also voted for Ram Nath Kovind, the presidential candidate of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA), against the party whip of voting for the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) candidate Meira Kumar.
Shivpal’s camp had been giving feelers that it might support the extra candidate of the BJP instead of the BSP candidate in the Rajya Sabha electionis.
Shivpal and Akhilesh have had a strained relationship since a feud broke out in the family in August 2016 over the control of the party. Eventually, Akhilesh won the battle for supremacy.