On the sidelines of SP meet, Akhilesh-Mamata rendezvous likely

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav is likely to meet his West Bengal counterpart Mamata Banerjee during the Samajwadi Party's national executive meet in Kolkata on September 12 and 13.

The conference, to be held at Nalban in Salt Lake, will be attended by the SP brass including president Mulayam Singh Yadav, UP CM Akhilesh Yadav and senior minister Azam Khan. On September 11, a party workers' meet is scheduled at Mahajati Sadan. The executive meet was supposed to be held on July 10 and July 11, but it was postponed reportedly due to a chill in relations between the SP and Trinamool Congress after the SP backtracked on its support for presidential candidates earlier agreed on by Mamata and Mulayam.

"This is going to be a very important meet as we are going to discuss various things, including our party's strategy for the 2014 general elections," Kiranmay Nanda, SP Rajya Sabha member and former Bengal minister for fisheries, told The Indian Express from Delhi.

At the meet, the leaders will also discuss from which states the party can field candidates in the general elections.

Mulayam has already declared that the SP —- at present the third largest party in the Lok Sabha with 23 MPs —- will aim to win 60 seats in 2014. In West Bengal, the party has only one MLA, Chand Mohammad, who has been instructed to start preparations for the meet.

"The leaders will start coming to Kolkata from September 11 and we are making arrangements for their stay at Nalban complex. With our party in power in Uttar Pradesh, it will be a gala affair. Some of the leaders will also attend the workers' meet at Mahajati Sadan," Chand Mohammad said.

Mulayam, according to reports, had always insisted that the meet be held in Kolkata — the venue in 1993, 1996 and 2010.

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