Uttar Pradesh: Mulayam plays watch and watch game

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With the media in overdrive over government formation in Uttar Pradesh, making and breaking alliances by the hour, the man who should be at the helm of all activity is quietly waiting and watching.

Samajwadi chief Mulayam Singh Yadav is neither overtly excited at the exit polls results - that put him as a clear winner - nor is he showing any eagerness to cobble up a majority from other parties.

"I will not speak about government formation until all results are out," he politely told reporters on Monday, making it clear he wasn’t going to jump the gun.

Even a group of drummers who came to celebrate at the SP headquarters were asked to leave, but not before being given an honorarium.

Mr. Yadav is also not happy at the way state SP chief - and son - Akhilesh Yadav - is being constantly pitted against Congress MP Rahul Gandhi in the media.

But Akhilesh himself is far from quiet. The young politician is confident that his father will be the next chief minister.

"We have a done a lot of hard work to ensure the success of the party and are hopeful of getting majority," SP state president Yadav told reporters in Lucknow.

Asked about the Chief Ministerial candidate of the party, Akhilesh said netaji (Malayam Singh Yadav) was everyone's choice.

"The elected legislators will decide, who will be the next CM. I think netaji is everyone's choice and will become the CM," he said.

About post-poll alliances, Yadav said that the situation would become clear after the counting and his party. On Congress leader Beni Prasad Verma's comment pitching for support to BSP, Yadav said that it was his views and his party has to decide on it.

With exit polls predicting a hung Assembly in Uttar Pradesh, Verma, who quit Samajwadi Party in 2007 following differences with Mulayam Singh Yadav, said he would personally prefer BSP to SP, which he dubbed as a 'party of goons'.