PSPL to SBSP: Uttar Pradesh's small parties get roasted in 2019 elections

While the big players continue to dominate the state's political scene, smaller parties are relegated to the background

After a feud within the Samajwadi Party (SP), Shivpal Singh Yadav, the estranged uncle of party President Akhilesh Yadav, had formed the Pragatisheel Samajwadi Party Lohia (PSPL) in October 2018, vowing to emerge as a strong socialist force against the SP in Uttar Pradesh.

In the run-up to the Lok Sabha election, the PSPL had brought nearly 50 smaller outfits to its platform and pompously announced  contesting all parliamentary constituencies in UP but one (the seat on which SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav is a nominee).

The PSPL was one among a gamut of similar political formations vying for electoral gains at