Amethi Lok Sabha Elections 2024: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and Union Minister for Women and Child Development Smriti Irani will be contesting the Lok Sabha Elections from the Amethi seat in Uttar Pradesh. Irani was declared the party's candidate for the 2024 LS polls.
Smriti Irani is bidding for a fresh term from the Amethi constituency. On the other side, the Congress party has named Kishori Lal Sharma, a party loyalist from Amethi, the seat Rahul Gandhi lost in the 2019 general elections to BJP leader Smriti Irani.
Sonia Gandhi contested elections from Amethi in 1999 before passing the baton on to Rahul in 2004. Irani had earlier filed her nomination as the BJP candidate for Amethi. The seat of Amethi will going to polls in the fifth phase on May 20 (Monday). May 3 is the last date for filing nominations for the seats that will go to the polls in the fifth phase of the seven-phase general elections.
Know about the political history of Amethi Lok Sabha seat
Rahul Gandhi represented Amethi in the Lok Sabha from 2004 to 2019. His father and former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, too, was an elected member of Amethi in the Lower House from 1981 till his death in 1991.
The party has won the Congress bastion in all but three Lok Sabha elections since 1951. Before Sonia Gandhi, former Indira Gandhi had won from Raebareli three times. The constituency also elected Indira's husband and Congress leader Feroze Gandhi twice, in 1952 and 1957. A member of the Nehru-Gandhi family has not contested the seat just twice, in 1962 and 1999. Both constituencies are traditional strongholds of the Gandhi-Nehru family, with its members holding these seats for decades.
The Congress, which is contesting 17 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh as part of the seat-sharing deal with the Samajwadi Party (SP), has announced candidates for all the seats. Rahul's defeat in Amethi, once considered a Congress 'pocket borough', at the hands of Smriti Irani in the 2019 polls was seen as a significant blow to the party's national prestige
BSP candidate
In Amethi, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) has fielded Nanhe Singh Chauhan as its candidate, replacing Ravi Prakash Maurya. Nanhe Singh Chauhan will face BJP's Smriti Irani in Amethi. Smriti Irani had defeated Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
The Samajwadi Party (SP) will not field its candidate in Amethi since it's in alliance with I.N.D.I.A bloc member Congress in Uttar Pradesh and allotted Amethi, Raebareli among 17 seats to the 'Grand Old Party'.
Smriti Irani becomes Amethi voter
Fulfilling a promise made to the people of Amethi of establishing family ties with her constituency, Union minister Smriti Irani has also become a voter of Amethi. According to the MP's representative Vijay Gupta, Irani applied for becoming a voter after getting a house for herself in Medan Mawai village of Gauriganj. She is now a voter of the village.
Irani considers Amethi as her family. She has built her residence to live among the Amethi family. With the construction of the house, she had started the process of making herself a voter from Amethi. The formalities have been completed now.
She has become a voter of booth number 347 in Medan Mawai village of Gauriganj assembly seat which falls under the Amethi parliamentary constituency, he said. Irani entered her newly-constructed house in Maidan Mawai village on February 22, 2024.
In 2019, Irani had caused a major upset, defeating former Congress president Rahul Gandhi on the seat by a margin of about 55,000 votes.
Gandhi's old political connection with Amethi
Amethi has a history with the Gandhi clan. When Sanjay Gandhi chose Amethi to contest his first election in 1980, the main reason was that the region was steeped in backwardness and he took it up as a challenge to develop the constituency. The same year, Sanjay Gandhi died in an air crash and Rajiv Gandhi decided to take over his brother’s constituency in the subsequent by-election in 1981.
For a decade, till Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in 1991, he held Amethi and nurtured it with attention and affection. Even as Prime Minister, he would drive around in his jeep from village to village, talking to people and sharing meals with them. After his demise, Capt Satish Sharma- a close family friend- won Amethi in 1991 bypoll and 1996 also.
In 1998, BJP’s Dr Sanjay Singh won the seat but when Sonia Gandhi made her debut in politics, she wrested back Amethi in 1999. In 2004, Sonia Gandhi moved to Rae Bareli and Rahul Gandhi took over Amethi which he won till 2019 when he was defeated by Smriti Irani of BJP.
The problem of Amethi is strikingly similar to the one faced by Rae Bareli. Representatives of the Gandhi family have become leaders in their own rights and instead of responding to people’s problems, they are busy with their own business. The old loyalists have been replaced by new opportunists in the constituency.
As a result, non-Congress parties usurped the opportunity to establish a connect with the people and this led to Rahul Gandhi’s stunning defeat in 2019. As things stand today, three of the five Assembly seats in Amethi are held by BJP (Tiloi, Salon and Jagdishpur) while two are with Samajwadi Party (Gauriganj and Amethi).
Gauriganj MLA Rakesh Pratap Singh switched his loyalty to BJP in the recent Rajya Sabha elections which means that BJP now holds sway over almost four seats. The Congress organisational network in Amethi has been torn to shreds and if one of the Gandhis does decide to contest from here, it will be a Herculean task to build up an army of supporters needed for electioneering.
The candidature of Kishori Lal Sharma from Amethi may not enthuse the party workers sufficiently even though he has been frequenting the constituency in the absence of the Gandhis.
Sharma has never been seen as a leader- at best, he is known as a Gandhi loyalist who acted as a bridge between the family and the constituency. Moreover, he is pitted against a giant like Smriti Irani who holds sway over Amethi in her inimitable way.
