Shivpal Yadav won't be spared the ruthless politics of brother Mulayam
Winston Churchill may have said of the communists that they are like crocodiles, when they open their mouths, you don't know whether they are trying to smile or preparing to eat you up. But ask Shivpal Yadav today, and he might say the same about his elder brother and Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav aka Netaji.
The reason behind this mixed bag of emotions felt by Shivpal is the reinduction of Ram Gopal Yadav, his bete noire, into the party. Not too long ago, Shivpal had expelled Ram Gopal with Mulayam's blessings.
He was the man whom both Mulayam and Shivpal showered with the choicest of expletives. They even dubbed him a BJP agent, someone who was willing to trade his party's interest for a reprieve from the CBI. But Ram Gopal is back and how. He was sacked for six years from the party by Shivpal but it was Mulayam Singh Yadav himself who reinducted him as leader of the party, national general secretary and member of the central parliamentary board of the party. Though Shivpal reacted with his trademark "I will obey whatever Mulayam Singhji says" remark, even he must have been rattled by this sudden turn of events.
Sources close to Shivpal view this turn of events as the loss of another turf for him. Slowly and surely, his power, be it in the organisation or the government, is on the wane as Ram Gopal - who was so severely and roundly criticised by Mulayam - has returned at a time Shivpal Yadav was led to believe that he has party structure in his favour with the ouster of Ram Gopal, despite Akhilesh Yadav being the chief minister.
But this development, coming in the wake of the recent emotional outburst by Ram Gopal, who blamed vested interests in the party for clouding Mulayam's judgment, must have been a huge shock for Shivpal.
In the political circles of UP, one of the most daunting tasks is to correctly decipher what Mulayam Singh Yadav is up to. He may be on your side, defend you vigorously and make all the right kinds of noises, yet you may end up vanquished.
Shivpal, a staunch supporter of Netaji, must be sharing this feeling.
A closer scrutiny of the way things have taken shape in the Samajwadi party of late reveals an extremely interesting pattern. What many perceive as pari-war is also seen by many as the settlement of the succession line in Mulayam Singh Yadav's family.
In this war, Mulayam may be seen siding with his brother, but the way the power structure has changed within the party, many see it as the vintage Mulayam realpolitik at display. Several senior leaders have said that it is next to impossible for Akhilesh to so openly defy his father's diktat, but what would you do, if he has his father's blessing to defy the diktat?
Shocking indeed, but in the life and politics of Mulayam Singh, such tactics are commonplace. The footage of Mulayam openly upbraiding his squirming CM Son is not unusually surprising, but what was never seen before was the son taking on his father. People who have seen and analysed Mulayam's politics for a long time believe that contrary to perception, Mulayam didn't share the enthusiasm that the Samajwadi Party repeat its poll order in 2017.
However, he saw it as an golden opportunity to settle the succession dispute once and for all. And his success can be gauged from the fact that if six months back anybody was asked about how good Shivpal's hold is on party, the answer would have been almost 100 percent. If you ask the SP chief the same question now, he would concede that in case of a split, not even 15 MLAs would go along with Shivpal. A win was never certain in 2017 for Mulayam Singh Yadav, but now the family succession is more than clear. After Mulayam, it is but Akhilesh and nobody else who will head the SP, with uncle Shivpal being relegated to the footnotes of Samajwadi Party's history.
Shivpal Yadav also tried his best to make himself relevant by trying to cobble up what is known as the grand coalition. He tried to get all the members of the erstwhile Janta Parivar in Lucknow to celebrate the 25th year celebration of Samajwadi Party. Talks were also opened with the Congress and it looked like Shivpal could be leading from the front as far as the mahagathbandhan was concerned. But he overlooked one crucial thing.
His nephew and CM Akhilesh Yadav didn't seem to approve of this coalition and said that Netaji would take a decision in this regard. Netaji did, and in one fell swoop he killed the whole idea of coalition, so assiduously built by Shivpal by saying there will no coalition but only a merger in the run-up to the Assembly election.
The Congress party retaliated by saying that oceans don't merge with drains. The outcome of this exercise was also similar. Shivpal was led to garden path only to be thrown at the nearest exit.
It is not that Shivpal doesn't understand the tactic, but with this throw of dice, he has been rendered helpless. He has Mulayam Singh firmly on his side but only figuratively. His elder brother openly chastisised his son, but somehow the son gained more in power. Shivpal understands the paradox as not many have seen and observed Mulayam as closely as he has. He would have never thought that one day he would be at the receiving end of the practised, ruthless realpolitik of his elder brother Mulayam Singh Yadav.