Blame on 'Shakuni mama' of the Samajwadis but little evidence

Sept. 14: "Shakuni mama" Amar Singh has become the fall guy for the convulsions wracking the Mulayam Singh Yadav clan four months before the Uttar Pradesh polls. In the Mahabharata, Shakuni, the brother of Gandhari who was married to Kaurava clan head Dhritarashtra, engineered the war between the Kauravas and the Pandavas to claim the throne of Hastinapur. Shakuni, uncle to the Kaurava princes, engineered the game of dice that triggered the battle. Amar is not a blood relative of the Yadavs, though in his earlier stint with the Samajwadi Party, he saw himself as family. That was until Akhilesh Yadav - aided by uncle Ram Gopal Yadav - concluded that if the Samajwadi had to return to power in the 2012 polls, he would have to wield the broom against Amar, whose hold over his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav, was "overweening and undesirable". Events seem to have turned a circle again closer to the 2017 election. Suddenly, everyone spoken to in Mulayam's Samajwadi sotto voce holds Amar culpable for dismembering the Yadav clan. They allege he has a knack of "wrecking" the "homes of friends and associates", citing those of a Bollywood star and the country's best known industrial "khandaan" as examples. At one time, Amar and these names were inseparable. Amar, who returned to the Samajwadi last April following his expulsion in 2010, was promptly rewarded by Mulayam with a Rajya Sabha berth. "He thought Netaji's (moniker for Mulayam) patronage was a licence to dabble in the family's affairs," claimed an Akhilesh aide. So what exactly was Amar's role in stoking trouble within the Yadav "parivar"? No Samajwadi member could put a finger on it, but suggested he was out to "take advantage" of fault lines in Mulayam's immediate family. Mulayam's second wife, Sadhana Gupta, has never concealed her ambitions for her son, Prateek, whose interests include body-building, wrestling and animal rights but not politics. On the other hand, Prateek's wife Aparna has periodically let on her political inclinations. The daughter of a former Lucknow journalist, Aparna is a Rajput from Uttarakhand. Much to the Yadavs' embarrassment, Aparna has supported the BJP on many issues. To fulfil her aspirations, Mulayam has fielded her as the Samajwadi candidate from Lucknow Cantonment for the impending election. For the moment, Sadhana has pinned her hopes on Aparna for a place under Uttar Pradesh's political sun. "But she has not abandoned her dreams for her son," a Samajwadi insider said. Sadhana's role has been covert so far. But she is supposed to have networked with leaders of her community, the Vaish or Banias. The traders' vote, traditionally committed to the BJP, swung hugely towards the Samajwadi in the last election. Sadhana is also said to have patronised Vaish bureaucrats in the Uttar Pradesh administration, to Akhilesh's chagrin. The deposed chief secretary, Deepak Singhal, was among them. Amar, who was never comfortable with Akhilesh, latched on to the coalition that was cemented between Sadhana, Mulayam's younger brother Shivpal Singh Yadav and Shivpal's wife, Sarala. For all the family ties Mulayam has fostered in his politics, he apparently opens his heart more to an outlier like Amar than a family member. "There is no great comfort level between father and son. Perhaps, Mulayam is more at ease with Prateek because Prateek is only 28 and more like a grandson to him than a son," a Samajwadi source said. Earlier, Amar had said: "Akhilesh is no longer a kid. He has to strike a balance between yesterday and today. Yesterday means leaders like me and today means Akhilesh himself." However, most Samajwadis, including old Mulayam faithful, believe Akhilesh's decision to drop Shivpal as a minister and remove the apparatchiks reportedly close to him was a "defining moment" for him. "Akhilesh seldom retaliates against his elders publicly. But he has understood better the requirements of contemporary politics than his father and uncle," a veteran socialist said. "He is convinced that a leader's image as shaped by social media and opinion-moulders is more important than political manipulations and cultivating criminal and corrupt elements to achieve one's political ends. "He has shown that when the occasion arises, he can hold his own. No wonder, many of us see him as the only right person in the Samajwadi." IAS transfers The Akhilesh regime today transferred 23 IAS officers, including eight DMs. --The Telegraph, Calcutta