The last expansion had taken place on October 31 a year ago when five cabinet ministers, eight ministers of state with independent charge and eight state ministers, were inducted by Yadav.
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Quami Ekta Dal (QED) with two MLAs which had merger with ruling Samajwadi Party ahead of Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh due next year is likely to end. And as far as Balram Yadav’s sacking is concerned, it is the Chief Minister’s decision, as it’s up to him to decide who should be assigned what duty.
The merger was announced by SP spokesman and senior Cabinet Minister Shipal Yadav, who is brother of Akhilesh’s father and party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav. “It has become SP’s practice to shelter criminals”, he said.
The Samajwadi Party’s embrace of the party of mafia don-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari is an “internal matter” and his “displeasure” over the merger is a “media invention”, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav said on Thursday. Balram Yadav is a close aide of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav.
The Parliamentary Board of the Samajwadi Party (SP) will meet on June 25 to deliberate on the potential candidates for the ministry.
Pathak said that earlier SP leaders had claimed that the merger would be announced by Mulayam Singh Yadav but later Shivpal Singh was asked to make the decision public. It is the right of the chief minister to appoint ministers.
Sources also say that Shivpal played a major role in the return of senior leader Amar Singh to the party.
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In the face of chaos and desperation in the party, Akhilesh Yadav is playing his part well, and trying to show that he is clean while his kin and party leaders mop up vote banks. “However, in this fight the biggest challenge seems to be coming from Akhilesh’s own family and the party’s core members”, said Lucknow- based political analyst Ramesh Dixit.
