Finally the suspense ended and Congress announced candidates from two important seats of UP, Rae Bareli and Amethi. While Rahul Gandhi will contest from Rae Bareli, the party has given ticket to Sonia Gandhi’s close aide KL Sharma from Amethi. Voting is to be held on both these Lok Sabha seats in the fifth phase. Today was the last date for nomination and the candidates have been announced by Congress today itself.

The question coming in everyone’s mind is that while the news of Rahul Gandhi contesting from Amethi was coming out till a few days ago, then why did the party choose KL Sharma? Rae Bareli and both have been strongholds of the Gandhi family for a long time. There were even talks of Priyanka Gandhi contesting elections from Rae Bareli. Her husband Robert Vadra had several times indicated through statements that he was willing to contest elections from Amethi, but Congress has made a non-Gandhi the party’s candidate from here.

Party towards old tradition?
According to experts, the party is indicating a return to its old traditions by giving ticket to KL Sharma. If we look at political history, something similar had happened in the beginning of 1990 also. Rajiv Gandhi was the MP from here till 1991, but in the by-elections held after his death, the party made Satish Sharma its candidate. Satish Sharma was re-elected from here in 1996, but in the 1998 elections he was defeated by BJP’s Sanjay Singh.

After this, when the Lok Sabha elections were held in 1999, the Gandhi family members returned to Amethi after eight years, when the party announced the candidature of Sonia Gandhi. In the year 2004, Rahul Gandhi started his political innings from Amethi itself. Rahul had already won the election. Till 2019, Rahul was the MP from here, but in the elections held that year, he was defeated by Smriti Irani by 55,000 votes.

Who is KL Sharma
Kishori Lal Sharma, the future candidate of Congress from Amethi seat, has been identified as a leader close to Sonia Gandhi. KL Sharma, originally from Ludhiana, Punjab, has been working as Sonia Gandhi’s MP representative in Rae Bareli for a long time. KL Sharma, who has been doing organization work in Amethi and Rae Bareli for almost four decades, knows each and every street of these two districts and every Congressman knows him. During the time of Rajiv Gandhi, he was sent to UP to promote the work of the government and since then he remained here.

were present with Rahul
For the last twenty-five years, the Gandhi family has been in charge of the campaign in Amethi Rae Bareli, especially from the nomination of Sonia Gandhi. In 2004, when Rahul Gandhi filed his nomination from Amethi for the first time, KL was present there and now after twenty years, he is going to contest elections in place of Rahul from the same Amethi. Now it will be interesting to see whether the party will give ticket to KL Sharma this time. Whether it is successful in saving the seat or not. KL Sharma’s full name is Kishori Lal Sharma and he is very special to the Gandhi family.