Senior Samajwadi party leader and minority affairs minister Azam Khan criticised the nomination of Amar Singh as the party candidate for the Rajya Sabha. SP leader in Rajya Sabha Ram Gopal Yadav who is brother of Samajwadi party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav is also vehemently opposing the candidature of Amar Singh.
"Its most unfortunate thing to have happened in the Samajwadi party. It will immensely damage the party in the long run. `lekin Yah Faisala malik Ka hai (but it’s the decision of the top boss of the party) said Azam Khan in Rampur in the late hours of Tuesday. He adding `` Nobody has the right to challenge the decision of the top boss. Mulayam Singh Yadav is the owner of the party, he can decide what he desires, none can challenge him."
Azam Khan left for Rampur on Tuesday after the meeting of parliamentary board. Azam Khan registered his strong protest in the meeting of the parliamentary board when his name was proposed. SP general secretary Ram Gopal Yadav also supported Azam Khan but decided to stay cool and left the meeting. Soon after the meeting Ram Gopal Yadav left for Delhi.
Samajwadi Party sources however said the leaders like Azam Khan are more concerned for their own clout, status and survival in the rather than the well being of the party. ``Mulayam Singh Yadav’s decision to nominate Amar Singh as one of the seven candidates for the Rajya Sabha comes as a political resurrection of the 60-year old wily thakur who is master strategist of the SP, ahead of the 2017 state assembly elections and party needs the services of Amar Singh for the crucial battle ahead’’, said a senior SP leader.
Questioning the political acumen and relevance of Azam Khan in the party the SP leader said "SP was a traditional party till 1996. The basic organizational network of SP was in rural and semi urban areas, but after Amar Singh joined in 1996, he brought glamour, political connections, Bollywood, network with big industrial houses. He managed to change the basic image of the party," said the SP leader, who requested anonymity.
Defending the nomination of Amar Singh, the SP leader said ``there is one quality of Mulayam Singh Yadav which cannot be matched by any other politician. If a person has been with Mulayam Singh Yadav during his good and bad times, the SP chief doesn’t forget it. He doesn’t care if the public perception of the person is good or bad, but he will return the favour if he thinks the person has served him well. And Amar Singh is one such person who continues to remain very close to Mulayam Singh Yadav,”
Other Samajwadi party leaders echoing the similar sentiments said `` most of the SP leaders, including Ram Gopal Yadav, Aam Khan and many others may not be very pleased with the decision of Mulayam Singh, SP is a typical regional party headed by a patriarch, the entire politics of the organization revolves around the patriarch. Amar Singh became the eyes and ears of Mulayam Singh Yadav and this made a lot of leaders jealous of him’’.
Amar Singh’s political career saw a downward spiral after his expulsion from the SP following fallout with Yadav in January 2010. Amar Singh floated his own political party, the Rashtriya lok Manch, in 2011, and unsuccessfully fielded a number of candidates in the 2012 UP assembly elections. He tried to revive his career again in 2014, ahead of parliamentary elections, when he and former Bollywood star Jaya Prada joined Ajit Singh’s Rashtriya lok Dal (RlD) but failed again as Singh lost the lok Sabha poll from the Fatehpur Sikri seat. Mulayam Singh Yadav by nominating him for the Rajya Sabha has given a new lease to his political life. This will be his fourth term in Rajya Sabha.