Amethi, Rae Bareli puzzle solved, now Wayanad questions, seat dilemmas await Congress

The Congress party finally declared its candidates for Uttar Pradesh’s Rae Bareli and Amethi constituencies early Friday (May 3) morning, fielding Rahul Gandhi and KL Sharma, respectively, from the two constituencies. May 3 is the last date for filing nominations for the two seats that will go to polls on May 20 during the fifth phase of polling for the Lok Sabha elections.

The announcement also makes it clear that Rahul’s sister and Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will not be making her electoral debut in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls. Congress leaders and workers alike had been demanding that in wake of former party president Sonia Gandhi, the incumbent MP from Rae Bareli, opting out of electoral politics, Rahul and Priyanka must contest from Amethi and Rae Bareli, respectively, as the two seats have for long been associated with the Nehru-Gandhi family.

Carefully crafted poll narrative need of the hour

It is premature to predict the impact that the decision of the Gandhis to retain Rae Bareli within the family and leave Amethi to their long-standing loyalist Sharma will have on the electoral outcome as well as the Congress’s morale, particularly in Amethi which Rahul had famously lost to the BJP’s Smriti Irani five years ago.

What is certain, though, is that the Congress will need to craft its poll narrative in the two constituencies very carefully not just to dent the predictable broadside that the Gandhis will face from the BJP during the elections but also on a litany of questions that are expected to come Rahul’s way on a likely post-poll scenario wherein he wins from both Rae Bareli and Wayanad, the constituency in Kerala that he had won in 2019 and has again sought re-election from.

To enter or abandon the electoral contest in Amethi and Rae Bareli would not have been easy choice to make for the Gandhis. The possibility of Rahul’s second consecutive defeat against Irani and its wider implications on the Gandhi scion’s political reputation would have weighed heavily on the Gandhis and their party over the past fortnight as they endlessly deferred the selection of candidates from Amethi and Rae Bareli.

What abandoning Amethi means for Rahul?

The Gandhis’ indecision on whether to contest or stay out of the poll race from their family bastions had already triggered a storm of taunts from the BJP, especially from Irani who continues to bask in the glory of her 2019 Amethi win. Sundry leaders of the saffron party have been claiming that the Congress’ first family was deserting its karmabhoomi and that Rahul was scared of a second consecutive defeat against Irani.

By entering the poll fray from Rae Bareli, Rahul may not so subtly be playing the emotive card of a son taking over the family turf from his mother, but that doesn’t effectively neutralise the expected broadside from the BJP which is certain to paint him as a cowardly deserter who lacked the courage to avenge his 2019 defeat against Irani.

If anything, his decision to abandon Amethi, a constituency he won in 2004, 2009 and 2014 and which previously elected both his parents – the late Rajiv Gandhi in 1981, 1984, 1989 and 1991 and Sonia in 1999 – to the Lok Sabha could make Rahul look like a sore loser blaming the Amethi electorate of letting him down five years ago instead of returning to the turf to win back voters’ confidence.

KL Sharma: Chargé d'affaires for Amethi, Rae Bareli

Congress sources maintain that the party had factored in all these ponderables while the Gandhis weighed in whether or not to have Rahul contesting from Amethi again. By choosing to field Sharma – who has served as the preeminent liaison between the Gandhi family and the people of Amethi and Rae Bareli since Rajiv’s victory from the seat in the 1981 by-election – against Irani, the Gandhis have tried to convey that they would still remain the overseers of Amethi if the party wrests the seat.

Though originally from Punjab, Sharma, a low profile and soft-spoken dyed-in-wool Congressman, is well-liked in both the constituencies and is seen as someone who is easily accessible and always willing to help. For all practical purposes, Sharma has been the Gandhi family’s chargé d'affaires for Amethi and Rae Bareli over the past four decades; and is deeply familiar with both constituencies and its people.

Sources told The Federal that though the Gandhis may have decided on Rahul’s candidature from Rae Bareli only now, they had instructed Sharma long ago to ensure that poll preparations in both constituencies were up to speed.

Intense groundwork

“For the past six months, he (Sharma) has been touring both the constituencies. He had identified booth level agents in both seats and put them to the task of collecting feedback from every household across Amethi and Rae Bareli. In Amethi, issues on which there is public anger against Irani were also surveyed repeatedly to make sure that the party has a highly localised and effective grassroots campaign,” a local Congress leader from Amethi told The Federal.

“While he may not have the Gandhi surname, everyone across Amethi and Rae Bareli sees him as an extension of the Gandhi family and the added bonus is that he is always accessible to the people in both constituencies… in fact, once Rahul wins Rae Bareli, it is certain that day to day affairs of Rae Bareli will still be managed by Sharma,” the leader added.

Whether these credentials would be enough for Sharma to take on a high profile rival such as Irani and succeed where Rahul failed five years ago remains to be seen. Rahul and Priyanka are expected to campaign extensively for Sharma and how they project his candidature may provide further clarity on what the Congress had in mind while finalising his candidature from Amethi.

Gandhi family’s strong ties with Rae Bareli

Fielding Rahul from Rae Bareli may, at the face of it, appear like a much safer bet for the party to ensure that the Gandhi scion doesn’t lose another election from Uttar Pradesh. The constituency, after all, has elected a Congress MP 17 times since 1952 while the BJP has won it twice and the now defunct Janta Party once.

The Gandhi family’s association with Rae Bareli also predates its links to Amethi. Rahul’s grandfather, Feroze Gandhi was Rae Bareli’s first MP in 1952 and his grandmother, former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi won the seat in 1967, 1971 and 1980. Sonia has been winning Rae Bareli since 2004 and in the 2019 elections, she was the only Congress MP to win from Uttar Pradesh, defeating the BJP’s Dinesh Pratap Singh by a margin of over 1.67 lakh votes. The BJP, which had also been waiting for the Congress to announce its Rae Bareli candidate finally decided on Thursday (May 2) to field Singh again and Sonia’s 2019 rival will now face Rahul in the poll battle.

Between the devil and the deep sea

Rahul’s may, thus, face a relatively easier challenge in Rae Bareli than what awaits Sharma in Amethi. For the Gandhi scion, though, the real challenge may come up if and when he wins Rae Bareli. Rahul is largely touted to win from Kerala’s Wayanad too and a simultaneous victory from Rae Bareli would force him to choose between one of the two seats to eventually represent in the Lok Sabha.

If Rahul forfeits Wayanad, he would be betraying a constituency that stood by him when his family turf of Amethi turned its back on him in 2019 but if he gives up Rae Bareli, he would attract the full force of a blistering BJP tirade accusing him of abandoning the one seat in Uttar Pradesh that has never failed the Gandhis (with the exception of 1977 when Indira lost the post-Emergency election to Janata Party’s Raj Narain). Early tremors of such a charge are expected to reverberate in Rae Bareli once Rahul begins his campaign.

The only viable alternative that the Gandhis may have to placate a predictably unhappy electorate of whichever constituency Rahul is forced to give up in the event of winning both seats and dent the BJP’s expected backlash may then be to give up that seat for Priyanka, who is staying away from electoral politics at the moment, ostensibly to campaign for her party across the country and act as the Congress’s behind the scenes crisis manager.