The demise of Sanjay Gandhi, the younger son of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, in 1980 created a significant political void for her. Sanjay Gandhi had been a trusted political ally to Indira during the Emergency in the 1970s and was considered her chosen successor. However, Indira’s plans took an unexpected turn when he tragically lost his life in an air accident in June 1980. Consequently, his parliamentary seat in Amethi became available for others to contest.
Given that Amethi was Sanjay Gandhi’s constituency, his wife, Maneka Gandhi, had hoped to inherit his political legacy. However, Indira Gandhi, who was both the Prime Minister and the matriarch of the family, had different intentions.
Maneka Gandhi, who had actively campaigned alongside Sanjay Gandhi in the 1970s, disagreed with Indira’s succession plan. This difference in perspectives and plans between Indira and Maneka led to a fierce conflict between the two, ultimately causing a division within the Gandhi-Nehru family regarding Amethi.
Amethi subsequently became a stronghold for the Nehru-Gandhi family, with the Lok Sabha seat being held by Rajiv Gandhi, followed by his wife Sonia Gandhi, and later their son Rahul Gandhi.
Amethi holds immense significance for the Gandhis and is no less important than the neighboring Raebareli constituency. However, in the upcoming 2024 Lok Sabha election, a non-Gandhi candidate from the Congress party will be contesting from Amethi, breaking a 25-year tradition.
So, why did the Gandhis, who fiercely fought for Amethi in the past, suddenly decide to relinquish their hold on this family bastion in the upcoming election?
KL Sharma, a loyalist of Congress, has been chosen for Amethi:
Considered as a significant shift in policy, Amethi will not have a candidate from the Gandhi family for the first time since the 1998 Lok Sabha election. In the past, both Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi have emerged victorious in the Amethi constituency, until Smriti Irani of the Bharatiya Janta Party defeated Rahul Gandhi by a margin of 55,000 votes in the 2019 general election.
Rahul Gandhi, who was expected to seek retribution for his 2019 defeat in Amethi and challenge the incumbent Smriti Irani, has now moved to Raebareli, another stronghold of the Congress party.
Surprisingly, the Congress party has chosen loyalist Kishori Lal Sharma as their candidate for Amethi. Sharma has previously represented various Congress stalwarts, including Rajiv Gandhi, Satish Sharma, Sonia Gandhi, and Rahul Gandhi, in both Amethi and Raebareli.
There was great anticipation surrounding the selection of candidates for these two constituencies in Uttar Pradesh, as they are considered to be among the few hopes for the Congress party in the state.
Addressing the absence of a Gandhi candidate in Amethi and justifying KL Sharma’s nomination, local Congress leader Yogendra Mishra stated, “KL Sharma is now a part of the Gandhi family. He has dedicated 30-35 years of his life working for the Gandhi family in Amethi… There is no discontent among the party workers… The Gandhi family will support KL Sharma’s nomination. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Rahul Gandhi, and Mallikarjun Kharge will be present…”.
Despite Yogendra Mishra’s claim that KL Sharma is a family member, he failed to disclose the reason behind Rahul Gandhi’s relocation to Raebareli and the abandonment of Amethi by the Gandhi family.
Regardless of the rationale behind this decision, some interpreted Rahul Gandhi’s absence from Amethi as a strategic move to save face, while others praised it as a brilliant move by the party.
Nevertheless, the fact that the Congress party did not field any Gandhi member in Amethi provides an opportunity to reflect on how a conflict within and surrounding Amethi led to an irreparable division within the Nehru-Gandhi family, which persists to this day.
The division of the Nehru-Gandhi family occurred when Amethi split.
Despite the Congress party’s consistent victories in Amethi since its establishment in 1967, they faced a setback in the 1977 Lok Sabha election when the opposition Janata Party formed the government after the Emergency. However, in 1980, Amethi chose Sanjay Gandhi as their representative, making him the first member of the Nehru-Gandhi family to win the seat. This victory is the reason behind Maneka Gandhi’s claim to the Amethi constituency.
Following Sanjay’s untimely demise, the family’s internal conflicts began to surface, ultimately leading to Maneka Gandhi’s departure from Indira Gandhi’s residence with her son Varun, causing a rift within the family. Amethi played a significant role in exacerbating these tensions.
To fill the vacant Amethi seat, Rajiv Gandhi, who was content with his career as a pilot at Air India, was nominated for the by-election in 1981 by the party led by his mother, Indira Gandhi. At the time, Maneka Gandhi, who was only 25 years old, helplessly witnessed Indira Gandhi passing on Sanjay Gandhi’s political legacy to Rajiv.
Due to her age, Maneka was unable to contest for the Lok Sabha seat at that time. Spanish writer Javier Moro highlighted in his book, The Red Sari, that Maneka was the one who initiated the discord by resenting the fact that her husband’s legacy was taken away by his brother.
Rajiv’s victory in the 1981 Amethi by-election and his subsequent rise within the party, closely monitored by his mother, hindered Maneka’s political aspirations.
The turning point occurred when Sanjay’s young widow participated in a convention in Lucknow organized by Akbar Ahmed, her late husband’s confidante. Maneka delivered a passionate speech at the event, announcing her intention to enter active politics, which displeased her influential mother-in-law. This was due to the fact that Indira was grooming her elder son Rajiv to take over the role left vacant by Sanjay Gandhi.
Indira, who was in London at the time, viewed Maneka’s actions in Lucknow as an attempt to tarnish Sanjay Gandhi’s reputation. Upon her return to Delhi, she was resolute in restoring order.
“Indira pointed at Maneka and exclaimed, ‘Leave this house immediately!’” Javier Moro recounted. “I had advised you against speaking in Lucknow, but you chose to do so anyway, defying my instructions! Your words were filled with malice. Do you think I am blind to that? Get out! Vacate this house this instant!” Indira shouted. “Return to your mother’s residence!”
As tensions escalated, Maneka gathered her belongings, took her two-year-old son Varun Gandhi, and departed from the Prime Minister’s residence amidst a throng of photographers, journalists, and law enforcement officers gathered at the gate.
“Photographs that portrayed the narrative she (Maneka) wished to convey, of a devoted daughter-in-law mistreated by her powerful and authoritarian mother-in-law. Maneka waved to the journalists from the vehicle,” read the caption accompanying the image published in newspapers across India and abroad the following morning,” Moro detailed in his book.
“Sanjay’s approach was to unify and govern. His supporters remained loyal – Mummy seeks to sow discord and govern through manipulation, what else can she anticipate but complete chaos?” Maneka Gandhi confided in a friend in 1981, as reported by India Today magazine.
The discord between Maneka Gandhi and Indira Gandhi grew to such an extent that cohabitation became untenable, as recounted in the autobiography of renowned author Khushwant Singh.
Amethi, following the division of the Gandhi family.
After departing from the Prime Minister’s residence, Menaka, resolute in her mission to carry on Sanjay’s political heritage, established the Rashtriya Sanjay Manch in collaboration with Akbar Ahmad, the organizer of the 1982 Lucknow Convention.
Menaka, in her bid to challenge Rajiv Gandhi, who she perceived as clinging to her husband’s legacy, took the battle to Amethi, the constituency that was denied to her in 1981.
She ran as an Independent candidate in the 1984 Lok Sabha elections from Amethi against Rajiv Gandhi but suffered a significant defeat, with Rajiv securing over 84% of the votes. He went on to win the Amethi seat four times; in 1981, 1984, 1989, and 1991.
Sonia Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi’s wife, who left no stone unturned in campaigning alongside her husband in Amethi in 1984, was elected by the voters in 1999, marking her political debut. Rahul Gandhi won the seat three times, starting in 2004, when Sonia Gandhi stepped aside for her son and shifted to Raebareli, another Congress stronghold.
The Rashtriya Sanjay Manch, Maneka’s new initiative that failed to take off, even attempted to gain control of Sanjay Gandhi’s assets, with three-year-old Varun Gandhi being involved in the legal proceedings.
Maneka, who later joined the Janata Dal in 1988 and the BJP in 2004, did not return to Amethi to challenge the Gandhis throughout the 1990s and beyond.
Her son, Varun, also joined the BJP along with his mother.
The selection of KL Sharma in the Amethi constituency, which has long been coveted by the Gandhi family, has been abandoned by them, sparking curiosity and speculation about the significant decision.
The reason behind the Gandhis abandoning Amethi remains unclear.
The Gandhi family members who joined the BJP, Maneka and her son Varun, shifted their focus from Amethi to the Pilibhit and Sultanpur constituencies.
On the other hand, the Rajiv Gandhi faction remained loyal to Amethi for a quarter of a century.
Except for the 1998 election when the BJP won, the seat was consistently held by the Congress. During that election, the Congress candidate was Satish Sharma, who was not a Gandhi family member. In 1999, Sonia Gandhi emerged victorious in Amethi, and the seat remained with the family until 2019, when Smriti Irani defeated Rahul Gandhi.
Fast forward to 2024, the delay in announcing Congress candidates for Amethi and Raebareli left many party members and supporters puzzled. The announcement was made on the final day of nominations, April 3, causing quite a stir.
While there were speculations about Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contesting from Amethi and Raebareli respectively, some even suggested a possible seat swap between the two.
Amidst these rumors, posters supporting “Robert Vadra Ab Ki Baar” in Amethi hinted at Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s husband, Robert Vadra, entering politics.
However, none of these scenarios materialized, and KL Sharma, a loyal party member, was chosen to contest from Amethi.
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra praised Sharma’s nomination as an example of “sewa ki rajneeti (the politics of service)” for the nation, while Smriti Irani, Rahul’s rival in Amethi, questioned his loyalty to Raebareli after leaving for Wayanad.
Priyanka highlighted Sharma’s 40 years of dedicated service in the region.
The prolonged discussions and debates over the two prestigious seats, lasting nearly two months, were due to the reluctance of both siblings to contest, as reported by the Times of India.
Congress leader Mallikarjun Khadge reportedly convinced the Gandhi siblings, with Rahul eventually agreeing to contest from Raebareli.
In his opinion piece on IndiaToday.In, Rasheed Kidwai, an author and political commentator, presented several reasons for Rahul Gandhi’s decision to contest from Raebareli and leave Amethi for Kirhori Lal Sharma, who hails from Punjab. Since 1983, Sharma, a native of Ludhiana, has been associated with the Gandhi family, particularly after Rajiv Gandhi represented Amethi following the demise of Sanjay Gandhi.
To begin with, the Samajwadi Party, an ally of the INDIA bloc, exerted pressure for a member of the Gandhi family to contest in Uttar Pradesh. This led Rahul Gandhi to choose Raebareli as his second seat, relinquishing Amethi, which he had lost to Smriti Irani of the BJP in 2019.
Furthermore, the Congress conducted a series of 16 surveys in Amethi and Raebareli, with their in-house pollsters predicting a certain victory for the Grand Old Party in Raebareli if a member of the Nehru-Gandhi family contested from there. However, the feedback from Amethi only indicated a 50% chance of success, as stated by Kidwai.
After nearly 44 years of conflict in Amethi, which caused divisions within the Gandhi family, it is undeniable that they ultimately relinquished the coveted seat and fielded none other than KL Sharma, an associate of Rajiv Gandhi and not a member of the Gandhi family, but still deeply connected to them.