Even as Lok Sabha leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi has hogged most of the limelight in the ongoing monsoon session of parliament by making a series of stinging remarks on Narendra Modi and the government he leads, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, too, has registered a strong presence in the House.
Now leading the second-largest opposition party in the Lok Sabha, the Kannauj MP has shown his mettle by hitting out at the government in an inimitable style that is not only reflective of Uttar Pradesh’s tongue-in-cheek satire, but also scathing in a way that complements Gandhi’s aggression.
Yadav has put Hindi idioms and heartland shayari to good use while aiming at the NDA government’s failure to stem growing unemployment, inflation, ‘paper leaks’ in entrance examinations, the agrarian crisis and state-patronised communal politics.
At the same time, he has taken deep digs at the BJP for its defeat in Ayodhya – which he attributed to “Ram’s will” and rising resentment among the backward classes, Dalits and Muslims – to claim that the government has been morally defeated by the “positive” politics of the opposition.
Here’s an example. Responding to the Union budget for 2024-25, Yadav mocked the treasury benches for praising a document that only showcases “despair” across sectors.
He then went on to roast the prime minister – though on grounds J.D. Vance is getting pilloried for in the US: “Those with family know how difficult it is to run the household, provide education to children and take care of the treatment of the elderly”.
He immediately followed this barb up with a Wasim Barelvi couplet. “Woh jhoot bol raha tha bade salike se, main aitbaar na karta toh kya karta? (‘He lied with such finesse, I had no option but to believe him’),” he said, amidst a cheering opposition.
“Ever since the government has taken over, there is a competition between rail accidents and paper leaks,” he said, as if there was no stopping him.
“This government is not one that would run, it is a government that will topple,” the SP chief said, fuelling further conversations on Modi’s dependence on his capricious allies.
Yesterday, Yadav was quick to broadcast the leaking roof of the new parliament building, asking whether it was a case of “paper leakage outside [and] water leakage inside”. Amidst these light-hearted jabs, of course, Yadav has also shown nerves of steel when he directly confronted BJP MP Anurag Thakur for mocking Rahul Gandhi as a person who “did not know his caste” but was still demanding a caste census.
“Jaati kaise pooch li? (‘How can you ask someone’s caste?’),” he asked the chair immediately after Thakur’s remark, reasserting himself as a flag-bearer of social justice politics.
His barbs at the government, which convey serious criticism in accessible but effective language, has distinguished Yadav from other opposition leaders, who have been more direct than him in their defiance. Yet, Yadav has shown that he is second to none in being at the forefront of holding the opposition flag in parliament.
Yadav has drawn added confidence from his electoral strategy of consolidating backward classes, Dalits and minorities, or Pichde, Dalit and Alpasankhyak (PDA). Yadav often invokes “PDA” as the reason for the BJP’s downfall in Uttar Pradesh and never misses to address their socio-economic concerns in parliament and outside. The success of this approach in the Lok Sabha polls has surely given him the room to pursue and reinvent Mandal politics and pitch it as the strongest ideological opponent to Hindutva.
The SP chief appears to be following in the footsteps of his father, Mulayam Singh Yadav, the founder of his party and former UP chief minister, who brought together a large number of backward communities under the SP’s umbrella. Like his father, Yadav, too, has understood the significance of building both social and electoral alliances, while taking care not to offend a community that may not be a part of the SP-led social coalition.
His decision to choose senior SP leader Mata Prasad Pandey, a Brahmin, as leader of opposition in the UP assembly points to Yadav coming of age as a truly pan-India leader.
In 2017, the coalition between the SP and the Congress backfired in the UP assembly polls as both parties could not channel their energies organically. The lack of chemistry showed in their campaign and also in the backroom.
However, much water has flown under the bridge. With Gandhi refusing to bend even an inch as LoP in the Lok Sabha, Yadav has been firmly by his side in the front rows, showing a combined fearlessness against a formidable BJP.
The ‘UP ke ladke’, as the SP-Congress alliance’s tagline went in 2017, seems to have found its feet, as Gandhi and Yadav’s jugalbandi in 2024 has truly been indefatigable.
This piece was first published on The India Cable, a premium newsletter by The Wire and Galileo Ideas. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.
