Spoilt for choice, which seat will Rahul Gandhi and Akhilesh Yadav vacate

Vibha Sharma

Chandigarh, June 12 

According to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, people of both Wayanad and Kerala will be happy with his decision on the Lok Sabha seat he chooses to retain. However, Gandhi also acknowledged that he was in a dilemma over which seat to retain—Wayanad or Raebareli.

“I will tell you one thing, my decision will make both Wayanad and Raebareli happy, I promise. Unfortunately, I am not guided by God like Prime Minister Narendra Modi is. I am a normal human being…I just have to talk to my people and decide what to do…” the Congress leader was quoted as saying in Kerala, while also taking an indirect dig at the PM.

According to agency reports, Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee chief K Sudhakaran hinted that Rahul Gandhi might relinquish the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat.

As far as Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav is concerned, his choice appears to be not as difficult as that of Gandhi. 

According to the buzz from Uttar Pradesh, he has already decided to retain the Lok Sabha seat of Kannauj and give up the Karhal assembly constituency he currently represents in the UP Assembly to “remain relevant on the national political scene”.

“In terms of sheer numbers, with 37 MPs Samajwadi Party is the biggest party after the BJP and Congress. Yadav would like to be in Delhi to keep an eye on his flock and remain a part of talks on the possibility of INDIA bloc forming the government in future,” according to political analysts. 

In those terms, Yadav’s task is easier than Gandhi’s who has to make the difficult choice of choosing between Wayanad that sent him to the Lok Sabha with a huge margin in 2019 at a time when Amethi voters preferred BJP’s Smriti Irani over him. In 2024 as well, the Kerala constituency returned him to the Lok Sabha with a huge margin but so did Raebarell in Uttar Pradesh—the state that may be pivotal to the political revival of Congress.

While thanking the people of Raebareli and Amethi for the Congress’s victory in the two Lok Sabha constituencies, Gandhi on Tuesday said had his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra contested from Varanasi she would have defeated PM Modi by over 2 lakh votes.

This, analysts say, may be an indication of the line of thought emerging in the Congress on the issue.

The Representation of the People Act allows a person to contest an election from two constituencies but the candidate must resign from one of the seats within 14 days of the results.

Sources say the senior Congress leadership is divided over whether Gandhi should retain Raebareli or Wayanad. While Kerala leaders want him to keep the seat in their state, the other section believes Raebareli is strategically more important.

Meanwhile, Yadav is currently an MLA from Karhal as well as the leader of the opposition in the UP legislative assembly. 

According to the buzz, Yadav has already explained to his party leaders the reason behind the option for the central politics and has also held deliberations over the candidate for the Karhal by-election.

The regional satrap won as many as 37 of the 80 seats in the state and sources say that the relevance of his chunk would only be possible if Yadav himself was there in the Lok Sabha to control and monitor his flock. So far as the state government is concerned, a buoyant SP leadership is already sensing a “very good chance” in the 2027 assembly election.