PM Modi wishes SP Chief Mulayam Singh Yadav on 75th Birthday

Lucknow, November 22, 2014 (Agencies)  Prime Minister Narendra Modi has wished Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav a "long and healthy life" on his 75th birthday. 

"On Mulayam Singh Yadav ji's birthday I extend my greetings to him and pray that he is blessed with a long and healthy life," PM Modi posted on his personal Twitter account.

The mega bash for the SP chief's birthday bash began at midnight with the cutting of an enormous 75-feet, 500-kg cake in Uttar Pradesh's Rampur. There were fireworks and cultural programme - the performers included popular sufi singer Hans Raj Hans. Some schools were shut for two days and students made to line the streets to welcome the SP chief as he rode past them in an imported



vintage buggy. 

This morning too, the state had lined up a series of programmes, including the distribution of 400 cycles to impoverished youths and scholarships for students. Mr Yadav is also expected to lay the foundation stone for a medical college at Jauhar University in Rampur and address a public meeting there.

The opposition BJP in the state had strongly criticised the opulent celebrations, saying it was a waste of public money in a backward state. "Things which Mulayam Singh used to criticise himself, how is he accepting it now?" asked state BJP leader Vijay Bahadur Pathak. "His birthday is being celebrated with government money. In schools, children don't have water to drink but they (the SP) cannot think of that."