Mulayam lashes out at Akhilesh to deepen SP fissures

Samajwadi Party, the ruling party of India's most critical state Uttar Pradesh between 2012 and 2017, has plunged into another bout of family recrimination, just days after the political organisation suffered a debilitating loss in the recently-concluded elections.

Mulayam Singh Yadav, the party patriarch, agreed with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's assessment of his son Akhilesh Yadav being disloyal.

Speaking at a function in their family bastion of Mainpuri -- about 350 kilometres from New Delhi -- Mulayam echoed one of Modi's speech about his son: "Yeh sahi hai jo apne baap ka nahin woh kisi ka nahi ho sakta (It is true that a son who can't be loyal to his father can't be loyal to his people)."

Modi, during the frenzied political campaign in Uttar Pradesh, had blamed Akhilesh -- the chief minister of India's northern state then -- for insulting his father by going against him.

Mulayam also accused his son of "humiliating and betraying him".

"While the people of UP voted for me in 2012, I chose Akhilesh to be the next chief minister, but he humiliated him thereafter," The Times of India quoted Mulayam as saying.

Mulayam's outburst comes after Samajwadi Party won a meagre 47 of the 403 Assembly seats in the 2017 elections.

The three-time chief minister of the state also lashed out at Akhilesh's decision to join hands with the Congress before the polls, especially because the party had launched "murderous attacks" against him in the past.

The father-son feud has been a protracted affair, stretching back to last year -- a bitter fight that clearly hampered the party's preparation for the elections.

(WION)