SP wars: Shivpal Yadav expels 7 of Akhilesh’s loyalists

Samajwadi Party’s Uttar Pradesh chief Shivpal Yadav expelled on Monday three legislators and four other leaders, all of them known as chief minister Akhilesh Yadav’s loyalists.

The action comes after SP’s national chief Mulayam Singh Yadav claimed on Friday that the uncle-nephew duo had patched up.

Those expelled were part of a group that demonstrated against the patriarch on Saturday for replacing the CM with Shivpal Yadav as SP’s UP chief. Shivpal Yadav said the decision to expel them was his elder brother Mulayam Singh Yadav’s. The CM also appealed to youth leaders, who had refused to work under the new state president, to exercise restraint and respect the decision.

Those expelled include three members in the Upper House of the UP Assembly: Sunil Singh Sajan, Anand Bhadauria and Sanjay Lathar. The four others headed SP’s youth wings. Many office bearers form district units quit in protest.

On Saturday, the CM restored all but one portfolios of Shivpal Yadav and promised to support him as SP’s state president, a post from which he was himself removed three days ago. Party insiders did not rule out a shake up in district SP units before the 2017 Assembly polls.