- Friday, March 14, 2025
Indira Gandhi lost from the seat in the 1977 elections when the Congress lost power in New Delhi for the first time.
By: Shubham Ghosh
INDIA’S opposition Indian National Congress has decided to field its former president Rahul Gandhi from the constituency of Rae Bareli after a lot of late-hour deliberations. The task was challenging for the party to pick names for the two seats of Rae Bareli and Amethi, especially because both have historically been strongholds of the party and more precisely, the Gandhi family — the power-centre of the party.
While the Congress lost Amethi in the 2019 elections when Rahul Gandhi lost to Smriti Irani, the current women and child development minister, Rae Bareli became vacant after ailing leader Sonia Gandhi decided against contesting in the general elections this time. The 77-year-old has won from Rae Bareli since 2004, including in the 2014 and 2019 elections when the Narendra Modi wave swept the nation. It is in fact the last remaining constituency of the Congress in the state of Uttar Pradesh, a key one in terms of electoral politics.
Read: Congress picks Rahul Gandhi to contest from Rae Bareli but questions remain
But the history of Rae Bareli also has a not-so-sweet memory for the Congress. While the Grand-Old Party has won the constituency 17 out of 20 elections since the first general election held in 1952 (including three by-elections in 1960, 1980 and 2006), it was also in the same seat that a sitting prime minister was defeated.
That prime minister was Indira Gandhi.
First represented by Indira’s husband Feroze Gandhi, a freedom fighter, in the 1950s, Rae Bareli had elected the former PM thrice (1967, 1971 and 1980). In 1975, the Allahabad High Court in Uttar Pradesh had declared Gandhi’s 1971 victory from Rae Bareli void on the grounds of electoral malpractice. She was barred from running for any office for six years subsequently but Indira hit back by imposing an emergency which continued till 1977.
Read: Irony! India’s Congress yet to pick candidate from two Gandhi strongholds for 2024 polls
She called elections the same year and faced adversity. She herself also lost, against Raj Narain, a Janata Party opponent, from Rae Bareli by 55,000 votes and the Congress, for the first time after Independence, lost power in New Delhi.
Indira, however, made a strong comeback when she won the same constituency in the 1980 election after the Janata government crumbled. But she resigned from Rae Bareli after winning from Medak, from where also she contested, in the modern-day Telangana state.
Arun Nehru, who also belonged to the Nehru-Gandhi family, succeeded her in Rae Bareli and won the seat in 1980 by-election and the next general election in 1984.
He was succeeded by Sheila Kaul, who won the constituency in the 1989 election, even if the Congress otherwise fared poorly.
The Congress lost the seat to the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 1996 and 1998 elections but in 1999, Sonia Gandhi, who is the daughter-in-law of Indira, won it and continued to remain a parliamentarian from there till 2024.
While she moved to the Rajya Sabha, the veteran politician penned an emotional letter to the people of Rae Bareli saying, “After losing my mother-in-law and my life partner forever, I came to you and you spread your arms for me. In the last two elections, you stood by me like a rock even in difficult circumstances, I can never forget this.”
She had also expressed confidence that the constituency will stand by her family.
Rahul Gandhi will contest from Rae Bareli against the BJP’s Dinesh Pratap Singh, who lost to Sonia in 2019.
