Shivpal meets Azam Khan in jail, says nephew’s SP ignored party veteran

When reporters waiting for the PSPL leader outside the jail asked him if he was with Khan or Akhilesh Yadav, he said, “I am with Azam and Azam is with me.”

Shortly after Shivpal Yadav’s prison visit, SP MLA Ravidas Mehrotra and an SP ally, SBSP leader Om Prakash Rajbhar, said they too will meet Khan in jail soon.

Yadav won the recent assembly polls on an SP ticket but has signalled his growing closeness to the BJP after the results, even meeting Adityanath once.

The senior Yadav said it was unfortunate that the SP is not helping or agitating for a founder of its own party.

The Azam Khan camp has expressed unhappiness with Akhilesh Yadav, claiming that he has been ignoring the jailed MLA and the Muslim community though it voted for the SP.

“He is the senior-most leader in the UP Assembly, 10-time MLA and has served as a member of Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. A man of such stature has not been helped by his own party,” Yadav said after the hour-long meeting with Khan.

He said the Azam Khan issue should have been raised in the Lok Sabha in the past under the leadership of SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, who he claimed has a good rapport with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Yadav said he will seek time with Adityanath to place the matter before him. “If he is saint-hearted he will surely understand his situation,” said the PSPL leader, whose last meeting with Adityanath had triggered speculation that he might cross over to the BJP.

He did not elaborate on what he sought for Khan, who is in jail for over two years in connection with cases that include criminal intimidation and illegal encroachment.

Yadav’s jail visit follows a recent meeting of Rashtriya Lok Dal president Jayant Chaudhary, an SP ally, with Khan’s family in Rampur.

Khan’s spokesman Fasahat Ali Khan had gone public earlier, accusing Akhilesh Yadav of ignoring the leader. He said the SP president had visited the party veteran in prison only once in the last two years. Following this outburst, the AIMIM had invited the jailed leader to ditch the SP and join Asaduddin Owaisi’s party.

In Lucknow, SP MLA Ravidas Mehrotra sought to clarify the party’s stand on Khan, reminding that the party chief had campaigned for the veteran leader in the assembly elections.

“SP president Akhilesh Yadav has said he wants Azam Khan released from jail,” Mehrotra told reporters. He added that Yadav had met Khan when he was admitted in hospital with Covid.

The former minister asked leaders of all opposition parties to meet Khan in jail, accusing the BJP government of framing him in fake cases. “I will also go and meet Azam Khan on April 24 in Sitapur jail,” he said.

SP ally Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party leader Om Prakash Rajbhar called Khan a tall leader of the opposition coalition and said he will meet him in a couple of days.

Without naming anybody, Rajbhar said, “Politicians are like ‘two-headed snakes’ as they keep changing their stand.’ Rajbhar also seemed to point at the low possibility of Khan joining the BJP.

“If you want to draw a political meaning in Shivpal meeting Azam, then it was in the media that he is joining the BJP. And if it’s so, will Azam Khan go to the BJP?” he said.

On Thursday, Shivpal Yadav had taken on Akhilesh Yadav over a comment by the SP chief alluding to his closeness with the BJP. He had then challenged the nephew to expel him from the SP legislature party.

The senior Yadav had formed his own party after falling out with Akhilesh Yadav years back but appeared to have patched up just ahead of the last election.

However, the rift resurfaced after he was not called to a meeting of the newly elected SP MLAs last month.

And after his meeting with Adityanath, Shivpal Yadav started following him along with PM Modi and former deputy chief minister Dinesh Sharma on Twitter. He also skipped a meeting of the SP-led opposition alliance.