After the major drubbing the party got in the just-concluded lok Sabha elections, Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav is wondering how he would tackle Narendra Modi in Parliament with a team of novices by his side.
The Samajwadi Party’s seat tally came down to five from 21 this time. While Mulayam won two seats, his daughter-in-law Dimple and nephews Dharmendra and Akshay Yadav are the other winners.
In his meeting with legislators here on Friday Mulayam lamented: “Dimple can’t speak; neither can Akshay Yadav, who is new to Parliament. Only Dharmendra Yadav and I have to take on Modi in Parliament.”
A legislator who attended the meeting told The Pioneer that Mulayam Singh time and again talked about the lack of strength in the lok Sabha. “With whom will I sit in ParliamentIJ With whom will I discuss the issues which need urgent attention of party leadersIJ Who all are there with me in ParliamentIJ Only these people!” he kept saying.
In the 15th lok Sabha Reoti Raman Singh, a seasoned campaigner was the chief whip of the party and he used to sit besides Mulayam. This time, Singh lost to Shyama Charan Gupta from Allahabad.
The Samajwadi Party chief attacked his Chief Minister son Akhilesh Yadav more than once for the party’s debacle. Mulayam looked at Akhilesh sitting beside him and asked: “How did Naveen Patnaik win, Jayalalithaa or Mamata winIJ”
The query was in reference to other Chief Ministers retaining majority in their States and recording comfortable wins. “What happened in Uttar PradeshIJ Why did we fail to win enough seatsIJ” he asked and Akhilesh Yadav remained silent.
Mulayam even said that when he was Chief Minister, the party had won 36 seats in the State while during Akhilesh’s tenure the number dropped to five.When the legislators were asked as to what went wrong in the State, different people gave different reasons. A few legislators said the party was wiped out because of polarization of voters, some said they were not able to take the message of the good work done by the party down to the people, while others said the lack of roads, power and water was responsible for the debacle.
Giving party workers a pep-talk Yadav asked them not to feel disheartened. “Politics is the hardest work and Samajwadi Party legislators should give justice to the people. You must warn people about the BJP and make them aware about how BJP leaders told lies and conspired during the entire election campaign,” he told legislators.
“There is no other party as strong as Samajwadi Party and Uttar Pradesh has moved ahead under its rule in the past two years. Ups and downs are a general phenomenon in politics and we should not be overly concerned about this defeat,” he concluded.