By Sharat Pradhan

Lucknow, March 27 (IANS) As campaigning picks up for the Uttar Pradesh polls, Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav is increasingly looking jittery as he smells conspiracies and thinks that even the Election Commission is against him.

Not a day has passed since the Samajwadi Party chief began addressing poll rallies in different parts of the state - the elections are spread over April 7-May 8 - when he has not voiced apprehension about being ousted from power.

"You must vote our party to power, otherwise the opposition will join hands to send me to jail," Mulayam Singh told the electorate at his home base in Etawah, shortly after filing his nomination for the Bhartana seat.

"A conspiracy is being hatched against me and my family," the wrestler-turned-politician said.

The Supreme Court has ordered the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to probe his assets in order to find it he had amassed his fortune through corrupt means. He makes it a point to tell his audience at rallies that it was a "Congress conspiracy to get the CBI after me".

Even Chief Election Commissioner N. Gopalaswamy's censure of Mulayam Singh and his younger brother Shivpal Yadav for violating the election code of conduct while filing their nomination before the Etawah returning officer was termed by the chief minister as partisan.

What seemed to have really unnerved him is the hooting at his election rally in Banda last week. Eyewitnesses claimed the chief minister looked so embarrassed that he made a hasty retreat after cutting short his speech.

Sources close to the chief minister were not convinced by explanations given by the local administration as well as Samajwadi Party activists that the mischief mongers were Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) members.

"After all, Mulayam had beside him the two closest relatives of dacoit Shiv Kumar better known as 'Dadua', whose name spells terror in that entire region," said BSP spokesman Swami Prasad Maurya sarcastically.

Mulayam Singh's frequent attacks on the autonomous Election Commission are seen as a sign of frustration.

"The Election Commission and the Congress are hand in glove (in trying) to oust my government," said Mulayam Singh at a rally in western Uttar Pradesh.

At another meeting he went to the extent of accusing the Congress of "still trying to clamp President's Rule in Uttar Pradesh".

In February, the Congress wanted President's Rule imposed in Uttar Pradesh following Supreme Court's disqualification of some BSP MLAs who had broken away to support the Samajwadi Party in 2002.

State Congress chief Salman Khurshid said: "With the Election Commission gradually taking command of the situation, making it difficult for the chief minister to have his way, frustration was bound to follow."