Just last evening the desi Game of Thrones in the Samajwadi Party’s Yadav family looked like it was culminating with father Mulayam expelling his eldest son and UP CM Akhilesh from the party for the period of 6 years. He also sent his cousin Ram Gopal Yadav who was in the Akhilesh camp, packing.
Just when one thought that Mulayam was King of the World after defeating his foes, TV Today’s Rahul Kanwal stepped in with a leaked email. It was also tweeted three days earlier by another account:
The alleged email dated 24th July was sent by SP’s political consultant Steve Jarding, who wrote to his alleged friend Adwait Singh, a former student at Harvard stating that and we quote (emphasis ours):
“On the media push front, my two cents are to advice Yadav Sr to orchestrate family feud scenario. Implicate the uncle consolidate Yadav Jr’s clean image and project as future head of the party.”
The rest of the alleged mail talks about Jarding’s other agendas. Jarding has previously worked for Hillary Clinton, Al Gore and Spanish PM Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.
The timeline of the event also fits if this indeed is the real email correspondence between SP’s political adviser and his friend. Even though Jarding’s appointment as political adviser was officially confirmed on 18th September, as stated by him in an interview he gave, the meeting between Akhilesh and him was first set up in June. So if he and Akhilesh first met in June, the family feud drama might have been one of his initial ideas as evident by this alleged email dated 24th June.
Also the whole feud began when somewhere in August when Shivpal Yadav threatened to resign alleging rampant corruption in the Uttar Pradesh government. This rift further deepened when Akhilesh removed Principle secretary Deepak Singhal in September.
If we are to believe this email that the plot was hatched somehwere in June or July, the family could have got a good one or two months to plan their moves. Also the advice to implicate Uncle too rings true as just Mulayam stated Ram Gopal Yadav was ruining Akhilesh’s future
Prof Ram Gopal Yadav is finishing chief minister @yadavakhilesh‘s future: Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav
— Times of India (@timesofindia) December 30, 2016
Interestingly in the same interview Jarding was asked about the family feud.
How will you handle the feud in the Samajwadi Party family?
My experience is that most people know family matters are just that, “family matters”, and that they are normally worked out within family members who at the end of the day love each other regardless of differences… Families normally work through their differences and move on and that is as it should be and that is what I believe will happen here
We had also speculated that all this could be a fixed match in our report on UP elections. Karan Johar’s Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham’s grand family reunion ending might just get topped by the Yadav clan this new year!
Adwait Singh, who is mentioned in the email and is Jarding’s colleague and deputy director of the company, Steve and Partners, though has denied ever having such an e-mail exchange. “The email is a fake released with the intention of making trouble in a party when it is already caught up in an internal family feud. First, Steve only began working with CM Akhilesh Yadav from August this year, while this email appears to have been written on July 24.”
Rahul Kanwal too, who had tweeted the email out, now says Steve Jarding has denied the email:
‘Those threatened by @yadavakhilesh impeccable credentials are spreading canards.’ CM’s advisor Steve Jarding denies he sent out the mail
— Rahul Kanwal (@rahulkanwal) December 31, 2016
Is this the truth, or is this damage control? One may never know.
