LUCKNOW: The first signs of a transformation came on the evening of September 13, 2016. Sacked as state SP chief by his father and party boss Mulayam Singh Yadav, chief minister Akhilesh Yadav hit back with a letter of dismissal: sending his uncle Shivpal Yadav, the second most important man in his government, packing.To those who watched the SP family feud from a distance, his show of rebellion seemed unreal. "Until then, Akhilesh was seen as the CM who was overshadowed by his father and uncles. The son had acted, sacking his uncle who was also a senior cabinet minister. The SP patriarch sudden ly seemed no longer in control," a senior SP offi cial said.The baggage of "four-and-a-half-CMs" had become stifling for Akhilesh, and it was perhaps time he shed it for good. As the clutch of Akhilesh supporters grew outside 5 Kalidas Marg, his official add ress of four years, the refrain too grew lou der: "We respect Netaji, but Akhilesh bhaiyya is our leader."Akhilesh, the football buff and Metallica-loving en vironment engineer, had in 2012, already set out to give his Samajwadi seniors an image makeover. The first signs came when the SP invited applications for tickets, and Akhilesh not only looked at them personally , but also sat with seniors as they interviewed candidates. Tickets were denied to candidates with "hard-tooverlook" criminal antecedents. D P Yadav, an accused in a number of murder cases, was elbowed out of the SP list, while over 80 under-40 candidates got tickets. It was not easy, though. Despite Akhilesh's objections, many with a criminal past were accommodated.This `swachchta' mission, half-done in 2012, led to the long-drawn battle that would culminate in upstaging Mulayam as SP president. But there were other factors that helped Akhilesh. If rising aspirations of a `chacha' was one, the bigger anathema to Akhilesh was the return of Amar Singh `uncle' to the party .His relationship with Amar has been uneasy for more than a decade. "Akhilesh thinks Amar spelt doom for SP . He gave Netaji, a grassroots politician, his brush with Bollywood and five-star culture. Though he helped Akhilesh as a youngster, he became a political baggage for the CM.Dimple Yadav's bypoll defeat in Firozabad worsened their strained ties," a senior SP official said.When elections were announced in 2012, Amar, the selfacknowledged `Mulayamwadi', was not the overwhelming presence, following his six-year expulsion from the party in 2010. He was in the periphery until his formal return to SP in May 2016, when Mulayam sent him to the Rajya Sabha.Akhilesh, who had watched all this helplessly , made his reservations known publicly, but Mulayam stuck to his stand. In less than six months since his return, the Samajwadi saga precipitated as UP watched Mulayam and the uncles tried to dislodge Akhilesh.The battle-ready CM fought back. On governance, his laptop scheme for Class XII pass-outs was successful, as were other schemes for women, and for families living below the poverty line. In a state wary of SP goons on the streets, Akhilesh launched the Women's Power Line, a 24hour helpline to assist women in distress.The debutant CM, who pitched himself as a forward-looking socialist, let his father and uncles cater to UP's deeply entrenched caste politics.Instead, he focused on development, portrayed his pro-youth image, and also nurtured the "we-put-the-family-first" vote bank, while making sure that he gained from Mulayam's occasional public criticism of his governance and moves.It was only when the family feud came to the fore on October 24 last year that Akhilesh made an emotional appeal to his father, saying he might have made mistakes in governing the state but his love, loyalty and respect for Mulayam had never diminished.Mulayam listened, but didn't relent. He sanctioned Quami Ekta Dal merger which Akhilesh had opposed, gave tickets to Atiq Ahmed and Amanmani Tripathi despite their criminal records, upgraded Amar as SP secretary, sacked the CM as state SP chief, and finally ordered his ouster along with Ram Gopal.At this point, Akhilesh decided to wrestle back. Cashing in on his popularity for Brand Akhilesh, he took uncle Ram Gopal's help to stage the January 1 coup, unseating Mulayam and emerging as the "Samajwadi Sultan", with the majority backing his candidature as SP chief.

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