Will Rahul Gandhi retain Raebareli or Wayanad? People of Raebareli say that the Congress leader won’t let them down, while political experts and party insiders believe that given the Nehru-Gandhi legacy and the sentiments attached, Rahul would hold on to this Uttar Pradesh Lok Sabha seat.
On Tuesday, almost a week after the Congress registered a thumping win in UP’s Raebareli and neighbouring Amethi, the two constituencies were abuzz with activities. The occasion was the Congress’s grand Abhaar Sabha (thanksgiving meet). Held at Raebareli’s Bhuemau village, the event was addressed by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra to express their gratitude towards the people of the two constituencies.
Rahul Gandhi won the Raebareli seat by a record margin of 3,64,422 votes, while long-time Congress loyalist KL Sharma snatched the Amethi seat from Bharatiya Janata Party’s Smriti Irani by a margin of over 1,60,000 votes.
“I want to tell the people of Amethi that I am the MP of Raebareli. But what I told you earlier is that the development works would be carried out equally in both Raebareli and Amethi,” said Rahul Gandhi, at the meet that witnessed massive footfall, with people from neighbouring districts too dropping in, braving the scorching sun.
Rahul in his address also highlighted the Gandhi-Nehru family’s association with Raebareli and said that the people’s decision to choose him over the BJP candidate was not political but out of love, care, and respect for the family. “The relationship between Raebareli and my family is probably the oldest. There is probably no other family that has a 100-year-old relationship. My great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru first came here about 100 years ago to Raebareli when there was an agitation of farmers in which firing took place on them. Back then also, it was the Raebareli’s farmers who set the narratives and this time too it was the people of Raebareli who changed the course of national politics,” he said.
His speech sparked speculation in UP’s political circles that Rahul Gandhi may retain Raebareli and give up Kerala’s Wayanad, the seat that he won by a margin of more than 3,90,000 votes.
“Indeed, the Nehru-Gandhi family shares an over 100-year-old relationship. And given the age-old relationship, the bond which the Gandhi family shares with the people of Raebareli, the chances are more that he may retain Raebareli and leave Wayanad,” said Sanjiv Bharti, a senior journalist who hails from the Raebareli district.
Bharti also said that Rahul in his speech referred to the 1921 incident when Raebareli witnessed a fierce protest in which farmers gathered on January 5 for a public meeting led by Amol Sharma, Baba Jankidas, Baba Ramchandra, Chandrapal Singh, and other leaders.
“To undermine the meeting, the Talukdar collaborated with the District Magistrate to arrest Sharma and Baba Jankidas and send them to Lucknow jail. Rumours spread the next day in Raebareli that the jailed leaders had been murdered, igniting widespread anger among the farmers. In protest, on January 7, 1921, a large group of farmers gathered by the sacred Sai River in Munshiganj to demonstrate against the administration. The British government, adopting a repressive stance, deployed numerous police contingents at the site,” added Bharti.
He said that Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, upon learning of the situation, attempted to reach Raebareli but was stopped by the administration at the railway station, possibly because the British feared his presence could escalate the situation if he were harmed. “As tensions rose, the administration ordered the police to suppress the protest swiftly, leading to indiscriminate firing on unarmed farmers. The brutal crackdown resulted in approximately 800 farmers being martyred and thousands being injured,” Bharti said.
A party insider too expressed the possibility that Rahul Gandhi may retain the Raebareli seat, highlighting that it has been a Congress stronghold since the first general elections in 1952 when the constituency was held by Feroze Gandhi, the husband of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. After he died in 1960, the Congress fielded RP Singh in the by-elections and retained the seat. Following this, Sonia Gandhi took over Raebareli, a seat she won for four consecutive terms. In February 2024, when Sonia announced her decision not to contest the Lok Sabha elections, she wrote a letter to the Raebareli electorate, who supported her for two decades.
“My family in Delhi is incomplete; it’s you all in Raebareli who complete it,” wrote the former Congress president. She added that her family’s ties with Raebareli ran deep and she received it as a “saubhagya” (good fortune) from her in-laws. Rahul Gandhi represented Amethi from 2004 until 2019 when he lost the seat to BJP’s Smriti Irani. He contested from Kerala’s Wayanad in 2019 as a second seat and won it to retain his MP status. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Sonia Gandhi won the Raebareli constituency, bagging 5,34,918 votes. Her closest rival, Dinesh Pratap Singh, put up a formidable challenge, gathering 3,67,740 votes.
In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress in alliance with the Samajwadi Party contested 17 seats in UP, of which it won six.
The state Congress too held a political affairs committee meeting in which a proposal was passed for Rahul Gandhi to remain MP from Raebareli. State Congress leaders believe that for the party, which was searching for its lost political ground in UP, it is necessary that Rahul Gandhi remains MP from Raebareli. If Rahul retains Raebareli, the leaders feel it will strengthen the state politics, which would play a pivotal role in the assembly elections to be held in 2027.
