Decode Politics: Why Rahul Gandhi gave up Wayanad, retained Rae Bareli, as Priyanka is set for poll debut
The Congress on Monday announced that Rahul Gandhi would retain his seat in Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh and give up Wayanad in Kerala where Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, his sister, will make her electoral debut. The announcement came after Congress’ top leadership on Monday held discussions at Kharge’s residence.
“You are now going to have two MPs, I will keep visiting,” Rahul said in a message to the people of Wayanad. “The people of Wayanad gave me support, the energy to fight at a very difficult time.” Priyanka said, “I won't let the people of Wayanad feel Rahul's absence. I will work hard, try my best to make everyone happy in Wayanad, be a good representative.”
What message does Rahul Gandhi's decision send?
In the recently concluded parliamentary elections, the Congress made a comeback in UP where the party lost all seats in 2019, including Amethi where Rahul was defeated by Smriti Irani. The party was at its lowest in 2019 in UP when its vote share was 6.36% in the state. In 2014, the party won two seats, Rae Bareli and Amethi, and its vote share was 7.53%. However, this time around when the party contested just 17 seats and left the rest for its INDIA bloc allies, it managed to win six and despite contesting the limited number of seats, its vote share increased to 9.46%.
With the positive result from the state which has maximum representation in the Lower House of Parliament, the party would like to send a message that Rahul is not abandoning the seat and state that gave him and the party a good result in the elections.
Another factor is that with the positive result for the Congress and the SP in UP, the mood in the state seems to be against the BJP. The party managed to win just 33 seats, coming down from 62 in 2019. It had won 71 in 2014. In 2019, the two main regional parties, the SP and the BSP, had come together and the BJP still finished with 62 seats.
With Rahul deciding to retain Rae Bareli, the party is giving a clear message: it will continue its fight in UP and the Hindi heartland and fight the BJP in the state, riding high on the results in the state. The Congress will try to retain some of the ground it has gained as it prepares for the 2027 UP Assembly polls. In 2022, it contested all 403 seats in the state but managed to win just two. Its vote share fell to 2.33% despite Priyanka leading its election efforts. With the Congress’s alliance with the SP working, Rahul keeping hold of Rae Bareli makes strategic sense.
Why Priyanka Gandhi from Wayanad?
Wayanad was a life-saver for Rahul when the Congress, at its lowest in 2019, was almost wiped out in UP, with Rahul losing the family pocket borough of Amethi to the BJP’s Smriti Irani. Some Congress leaders in Kerala at the time also attributed the party-led United Democratic Front’s (UDF) near sweep of the parliamentary elections in the state to Rahul’s decision to contest from Wayanad, a seat that the Congress has never lost. Given Rahul’s connection with the seat, the Gandhi family did not want to give it up. Another crucial factor is that this decision insulates the Gandhi family from criticism that it gave up on the South after the job was done. Now, the family will have representatives in both the North and the South.
Hence, the decision to field Priyanka. With this, the Congress in Kerala will still have a Gandhi in its corner and Wayanad is as safe a seat as possible for Priyanka’s electoral debut.
What is the Nehru-Gandhi family’s connection with Rae Bareli?
The association of the seat with the Nehru Gandhi family started just five years after Independence. Feroze Gandhi, the siblings’ grandfather, was the first to contest the seat in 1952 when the constituency had two members and was called “Pratapgarh District (West)-cum-Rae Bareli District (West)” and in 1957. He won both times. Feroze, however, did not complete his second term, passing away in 1960.
In 1967, Indira Gandhi contested her first Lok Sabha poll from Rae Bareli, winning over 55% of the votes polled and won the seat again in 1971. But Indira was disqualified from the seat by the Allahabad High Court in 1975. In the 1977 Lok Sabha elections, held after 21 months of Emergency, Indira lost the seat.
In the 1980 elections, Indira contested from Medak in Andhra Pradesh (present-day Telangana) and Rae Bareli. She won both seats and chose to resign from Rae Bareli. Then in the bypoll the same year, the seat was won by Arun Nehru, cousin of Indira and a close aide of the Gandhis (Indira and later Rajiv). He won the seat again in 1985 after Indira Gandhi’s assassination.
The 1989 and 1991 elections saw Sheila Kaul getting Congress tickets and winning the seat. She was the wife of Kailas Nath Kaul, the brother of Jawaharlal Nehru’s wife Kamala Nehru. In the 1996 Lok Sabha polls, BJP’s Ashok Singh won the election and then won it again in 1998.
Sonia Gandhi took over the reins of the Congress in 1998. The following year, she fielded Satish Sharma, a trusted aide of Rajiv Gandhi and later her, from Rae Bareli who won the seat. In 2004, Sonia decided to contest from Rae Bareli and won, repeating the feat In 2009, 2014 and 2019.
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