Once upon a time, a leader whose word was the command for a region, a party

Even before the SP was formed, Azam had been elected MLA from Rampur four times – on the tickets of the Janata Party, Janata Dal, Lok Dal and Janata Party (Secular) of Chaudhary Charan Singh.

However, while his clout was at the time confined to Rampur, it was after Mulayam came to power that Azam’s popularity grew, with the SP chief making him a Cabinet minister with multiple portfolios in all the three governments that he headed.

Initially, when the SP’s reins passed on effectively to Mulayam’s son Akhilesh Yadav, and the latter headed the government formed by the party in 2012, it looked like there would be no dent in Azam’s position. He was allotted eight portfolios and was regarded commonly as the SP’s biggest leader after Akhilesh.

Opposition parties would often say that there were several CMs in the Akhilesh government – including Mulayam, his brother Shivpal Yadav, his cousin Ram Gopal Yadav, and Azam.

However, things soured not long after. In July 2012, Azam resigned as minister in-charge of Muzaffarnagar and Ghaziabad districts after he was replaced as minister in-charge of Meerut. This was after a minister, Shahid Manzoor, complained that he was not consulted by Azam while taking decisions regarding the district. But Azam was persuaded to take his resignation back by the SP.

In August 2012, Azam demanded the suspension of then Lucknow Municipal Commissioner N P Singh for allegedly not addressing the problem of garbage in the city. He stopped attending office to press his demand, and Akhilesh had to visit his house to soothe him.

In February 2013, after 36 pilgrims to the Kumbh Mela were killed in a stampede, Azam quit as chairman of the Mela organising committee. Again, his resignation was turned down.

Soon after, as the Muzaffarnagar communal riots – one of the worst the state has seen – raged, Azam criticised the Akhilesh government’s handling of the violence. He also skipped a two-day national executive of the SP in Agra.

Leaders such as Ram Gopal Yadav, the party national general secretary who was seen to be in Akhilesh’s camp, sought Azam’s resignation over this. However, Mulayam, still the SP chief, again went out of his way to placate Azam. While he placed a call to Azam from Agra, he dispatched Akhilesh to Lucknow to meet him.

While the episodes proved how valuable Azam was to Mulayam, and by extension the SP, he also earned enough enemies in the party. SP insiders talked about how under the Akhilesh government from 2012 to 2017, all postings and transfers of government officials in Rampur and adjoining districts – be it in the administration or police – were done as per Azam’s wishes.

Besides, no candidate could be chosen for any elections in Rampur and adjoining seats without Azam’s approval.

Akhilesh reportedly didn’t appreciate the fact that even as he was trying to mould the SP into a new image, Azam’s Rampur continued to be seen as a power centre – second only to Lucknow (the seat of power) and Etawah (the Mulayam family turf).

An incident that was seen to exemplify this best was the theft of seven buffaloes from Azam’s farmhouse in February 2014. Police pressed in sniffer dogs and personnel from several police stations to trace the animals. The buffaloes were finally found within 48 hours, but three policemen were sent to Police Lines as punishment posting, allegedly for dereliction of duty.

Azam quipped then that his buffaloes were more famous than Queen Victoria.

In October 2016, by when an ailing Mulayam had receded into the background and the power struggle within the SP was out into the open, Azam remained absent from a meeting of all SP office-bearers in Lucknow. With the BJP led by Narendra Modi having come to power at the Centre by an absolute majority by then, Azam issued a statement saying Muslims were “very worried because of the political happenings in the state and the country”, and that the community “sees its future as dark”.

In November 2016, Azam skipped a mega event called to celebrate the silver jubilee of the party. Next, he chose to stay away from the launch of Akhilesh’s ‘Samajwadi Vikas Rath Yatra’, ahead of the Assembly elections of 2017.

One reason for Azam’s unhappiness was said to be the reinduction of Amar Singh into the SP. The two had a rivalry going long back.

By the end of 2017, with the BJP now in power in both the state and at the Centre, the string of cases against Azam began. He was arrested for the first time in 2020.

His isolation within the SP was seen as complete, with the top leadership not visiting him in jail.

Then, in June 2022, in a huge blow to Azam, the BJP won the Rampur Lok Sabha by-election – the seat he had vacated on his election as an MLA that year. The defeat was made more bitter by the fact that the SP had fielded Azam’s long-time associate Asim Raja.

Six months down the line, the BJP won the Rampur Assembly seat too in a bypoll, again defeating Asim Raja. This time the bypoll was necessitated due to Azam’s disqualification from the state Assembly after he was convicted in a 2019 hate speech case.

Having stayed away, Akhilesh finally visited Azam in jail in March 2024 – which was seen as driven by the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections. However, Azam did not have his way eventually. While he again recommended that his faithful Asim Raja be fielded by the SP from the Rampur Lok Sabha seat, it was met with much opposition. Finally, Raja’s nomination papers as “the SP candidate” were rejected during scrutiny; and the person fielded by the party instead, Mohibbullah, won despite lack of support from Azam’s loyalists.

On Friday, amid rumours that Azam might look for other options now that he is out of jail, the SP ensured it made all the right noises. While SP leaders were present to receive him outside Sitapur jail, Akhilesh said that in an SP government, all the “false” cases against Azam Khan would be withdrawn.