Mulayam-Akhilesh Yadav Meet Flops, Cycle Decision Likely On Friday

Lucknow: The wearying battle between Mulayam Singh and his son, Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, is not resolved despite a morning meeting between the competing power centres in the Samajwadi Party.

The pair have also been informed by the Election Commission that on Friday, it will review and most likely decide whose team is entitled to the party symbol of the cycle which serves as a crucial and easy connect with voters.

Mulayam Singh, 77, says that he's the original founder of the Samajwadi Party and remains its President despite a recent party meeting which conferred the title on his son. In parallel, the 43-year-old Chief Minister offers the argument that more than 90 percent of the party's legislators and leaders support him over his father, as attested by thousands of signatures that he has furnished to the Election Commission.

Despite flagging attempts to make nice between the party patriarch and his son, the teams they lead pushed ahead this week with efforts to claim the cycle as their own, telegraphing that a reconciliation has been all but written off.

Last night, Mulayam Singh said that if their party is re-elected, Akhilesh Yadav will return as Chief Minister, shelving his earlier insistence that he alone would decide who would lead the government if the Samajwadi Party managed a second term. The statement had the desired effect in this morning's meeting, but no unravelling was managed because the Chief Minister refused to allow his father to return as party president. On the other hand, Mulayam Singh made no offer of load-shedding close aide Amar Singh and trusted brother Shivpal Yadav, as demanded by Akhilesh Yadav who has accused them of manipulating and misleading his father on how to handle his son and the approaching election that is barely a month away.