Rahul Gandhi had carried forward the legacy of the Gandhis in Amethi. (File)
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.