After days of speculation on whether Rahul Gandhi would contest the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from Amethi, Congress on Friday announced Kishori Lal Sharma as its candidate against BJP’s Smriti Irani. Mr Sharma, a loyalist of the Gandhi family, filed his nomination from Amethi, a seat Congress has only lost thrice since 1967.

Amethi will vote in the fifth phase on May 20.

History of the Amethi Lok Sabha seat

The Amethi Lok Sabha constituency was formed in 1967 after the delimitation of parliamentary constituencies. It includes five assembly segments – Tiloi, Salon, Jagdishpur, Gauriganj and Amethi. From 1967 to 1977, Vidya Dhar Bajpai of the Congress was the MP from this seat.

First non-Congress winner

In 1977, Sanjay Gandhi, the younger son of then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, made his electoral debut from Amethi. In the post-Emergency era, when the anti-Congress sentiment was at an all-time high, Sanjay Gandhi lost the seat to Ravindra Pratap Singh of the Janata Party.

It was also the first time Amethi voted for a non-Congress candidate.

In the same election, Indira Gandhi also lost the Rae Bareli seat, another Congress stronghold.

When Congress wrestled Amethi

In 1980, Sanjay Gandhi won from Amethi but his tenure was cut short by his death in a plane crash. Following Sanjay Gandhi’s death, his older brother Rajiv Gandhi forayed into politics. In the 1981 Amethi by-elections, Rajiv Gandhi won by a huge margin of over 2 lakh votes against Lok Dal candidate Sharad Yadav.

Rajiv Gandhi, who went on to become India’s Prime Minister in 1984 after the assassination of his mother Indira Gandhi, represented Amethi multiple times, winning elections in 1984, 1989 and 1991. 

Following Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination in 1991, Satish Sharma, a close aide of the family, won the by-elections for the Amethi seat. He was re-elected in 1996. Two years later, Mr Sharma lost to BJP’s Sanjay Singh in the 1998 Lok Sabha elections. 

When Sonia Gandhi made her political debut

In 1999, Rajiv Gandhi’s wife Sonia Gandhi entered active politics with a debut from the Amethi constituency. Five years later, she vacated the seat for her son Rahul Gandhi, and moved to Rae Bareli. 

How Rahul Gandhi performed in Amethi

In the next three elections, Rahul Gandhi carried forward the legacy of the Gandhis in Amethi, winning three successive elections before his shock defeat to BJP’s Smriti Irani in 2019.  

Since the first Lok Sabha election following the second delimitation, the Congress party has lost the Amethi seat only thrice — 1977, 1998 and 2019.

The nomination of Kishori Lal Sharma is also the first time in 25 years that a non-Gandhi is contesting the Amethi seat on a Congress ticket.

The Congress has fielded Kishori Lal Sharma – a longtime loyalist of the Gandhi family – from Amethi which he looked after in their absence.

The Congress decision was announced this morning after weeks of suspense.

Kishori Lal Sharma or KL Sharma thanked the party for the opportunity to contest from Amethi – Gandhis’ family bastion – in Uttar Pradesh.

“I would like to thank Khargeji, Sonia ji, Rahul ji, and Priyanka ji for giving a “chotte” karyakarta like me an opportunity to contest from a seat that is their family bastion. I will work hard. I have been working in this constituency for the last 40 years,” he said.

On BJP’s allegations that Gandhis opted out of Amethi because they were “scared”, KL Sharma said that Rahul Gandhi is fighting for the whole country.

“Rahul Gandhi is not someone who runs away from the ground. He is fighting for the whole country,” he said.

Rahul Gandhi, who was expected to make an all-out bid to win back Amethi, has been announced as the party candidate from Raebareli.

Mr Gandhi had lost the family bastion – Amethi -in a shock defeat to the BJP’s Smriti Irani in 2019.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, though, remained firm on her decision not to contest despite much pressure. There was widespread expectation that she would step into her mother’s shoes in Raebareli.

The Congress will contest 17 of UP’s 80 Lok Sabha seats, with the remaining 63 going to INDIA bloc ally Samajwadi Party and regional outfits.

The Amethi seat in Uttar Pradesh had been a Gandhi family stronghold until it fell to a strong BJP wave in 2019. While his supporters would have expected Rahul Gandhi to make a bid to reclaim this lost fortress, the Congress has chosen a non-Gandhi after 26 long years for the task.

Kishori Lal Sharma, an ardent loyalist of the Gandhi family, is the Congress candidate from Amethi this time. He will only be the second non-Gandhi Congress candidate in three decades to fight from the seat held by at least four Gandhi family members at different times.

The last non-Gandhi candidate from this seat was Satish Sharma, who won it twice after it had fallen vacant following the assassination of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi. But he tasted defeat in the 1998 election.

Prestige Battle For Congress

Amethi isn’t just another Lok Sabha constituency for the Congress. It’s a legacy seat represented by Rajiv Gandhi, his brother Sanjay Gandhi, wife Sonia Gandhi, and son Rahul Gandhi.

Sanjay Gandhi won the seat in 1990, but after his death in an air crash that year led to bypolls in 1981. Rajiv Gandhi got the seat and won it four times until his assassination in 1991.

The Congress chose Satish Sharma to contest the bypolls and won it. Mr Sharma went on to win it for a second time in 1996, but fell short of votes in 1998. BJP won the election.

In the general elections a year later, Sonia Gandhi clinched it back from the BJP, and passed it over to son Rahul Gandhi. Mr Gandhi, who would go on to head the Congress a decade later, won the seat in 2004, 2009, and 2014.

In 2019, he lost to the BJP’s Smriti Irani, now a Union minister, but remained an MP by winning a second seat in Kerala – Wayanad.

Five years since, Mr Gandhi re-contested the Wayanad seat amid speculations that he might try to win Amethi back too. But the Congress had other plans. It has fielded Kishori Lal Sharma from the seat, while offering Raebareli – the only seat held by the Congress in Uttar Pradesh – to Mr Gandhi.

Mr Gandhi will now be contesting from the seat his mother Sonia Gandhi has represented for five consecutive terms since 2004 until she decided to move to Rajya Sabha. And after 26 years, his Amethi seat will see a non-Gandhi fighting to keep the Congress flag flying high.

New Delhi:

The Congress has fielded Kishori Lal Sharma, from Amethi – a longtime loyalist of the Gandhi family, from the prestigious seat which he looked after in their absence. The Congress decision was announced this morning after weeks of suspense.

Rahul Gandhi, who was expected to make an all-out bid to win back Amethi, has been announced as the party candidate from Raebareli. Mr Gandhi had lost the family bastion – Amethi -in a shock defeat to the BJP’s Smriti Irani in 2019.

The Congress will contest 17 of UP’s 80 Lok Sabha seats, with the remaining 63 going to INDIA bloc ally Samajwadi Party and regional outfits.

All you need to know about KL Sharma:

1. Kishori Lal Sharma or KL Sharma is from Ludhiana in Punjab and has been associated with the Congress for over four decades.
2. Kishori Lal Sharma first came to Amethi in 1983 and has been working for the party in the constituency since then.
3. Party sources say Kishori Lal Sharma was a close associate of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. His bond with the Gandhi family grew stronger after Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination in 1991.
4. KL Sharma, sources say, played a key role in Sonia Gandhi’s first win from Amethi in 1999, which earned her a seat in Parliament.
5. Mr Sharma managed party affairs in Amethi and Raebareili after Sonia Gandhi vacated the seat for son Rahul.