Fresh Akhilesh-Shivpal spat brewing? Uncle not invited at SP MLAs meet

New Delhi: Shivpal Singh Yadav, who contested and won the recent Uttar Pradesh elections on Samajwadi Party (SP) ticket is miffed with the party for not having been invited by his nephew and the party chief Akhilesh Yadav for a meeting of all the SP legislators.

“I was not invited to the party meeting. I waited for two days and cancelled all my programs for this meeting but I wasn’t invited. I am an MLA from Samajwadi Party but still not invited,” Shivpal told ANI. Shivpal Singh Yadav severed ties with Samajwadi Party in 2017 but contested the 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections from Jaswantnagar as SP’s candidate.

The Samajwadi Party maintains that Akhilesh has called a separate meeting with the leaders, national presidents and legislators of all its allies on March 28.

“Akhilesh Yadav has invited leaders, national presidents and MLAs of our ally parties on March 28. They will come that day,” said Naresh Uttam Patel, the SP’s state president.

The development may widen the rift between Akhilesh and his uncle Shivpal didn’t contest the elections from Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party (Lohia), which he had floated after breaking away from Samajwadi Party.

A meeting of all the newly-elected SP legislators was chaired by the party chief Akhilesh Yadav at their headquarters in Lucknow on Saturday and was elected as the leader of the SP legislative party.

“Akhilesh Yadav has been unanimously elected as the Leader of the SP Legislative Party. The process of electing the Leader of Opposition will be done in Assembly, the party will write and send and it will be done there,” said Patel.

Earlier this month, Shivpal had held the SP responsible for its defeat in the assembly elections.

“The atmosphere was conducive for the party to win the elections but there were organisational shortcomings,” he had said after poll results came out on March 10.