‘100-yr-old’ ties with Rae Bareli, Amethi — Sonia & Rahul on constituencies that gave them ‘everything’

New Delhi: To rekindle their bond with voters in Amethi and Rae Bareli, Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and son Rahul Tuesday released a video where they reminisced about their “100-year-old” relationship with these two constituencies in Uttar Pradesh.

In a free-wheeling chat with each other, the Gandhis said Amethi and Rae Bareli “gave us everything” and that the family would be there whenever needed.

Rahul said his great grandfather Jawaharlal Nehru started his work and politics from Rae Bareli, “fighting against the British during an andolan”. Sonia Gandhi joined in to say: “In 1921, Pandit Nehru started his political career. He sent a message to meet a farmer leader — Baba Ram Chandra. He (Chandra) told his grievances to Panditji and Panditji said ‘I will also go’. So he went to Pratapgarh, then Rae Bareli, followed by other places nearby.”

She recounted her maiden visit to Rae Bareli in 1981-82, when medical camps were put up and doctors from Delhi came to help out. The seat has sent several members of the Nehru-Gandhi family to 10 Lok Sabhas, including Feroze Gandhi, Indira Gandhi, Arun Nehru, and Sonia herself.

The family’s electoral tryst with Rae Bareli began in 1952, when Indira Gandhi’s husband, Feroze Gandhi, was elected as MP. “Rahul’s grandfather was, in fact, the MP from Rae Bareli since 1952”, said Sonia, adding, “After his (Nehru’s) death, (Rahul’s) Dadi fought Lok Sabha from there.”

On her two-decade stint as a parliamentarian from Rae Bareli, Sonia said she has gone door-to-door,village-to-village to meet people and inquire about their well-being and life events. “If someone died, if someone had a marriage… One time there were floods, another time there was a drought. I always went there,” she said, marvelling at how the people of Rae Bareli had quickly accepted her. “The relationship was like that of beti and bahu with the people.”

Rahul spoke about father Rajiv Gandhi’s work in Amethi in 1982 when many roads were constructed to completely transform the area. “In Raebareli, grandmother had done a lot of development and therefore it had slightly surpassed Amethi. When dad went to Amethi, he worked a lot and then Amethi went ahead of Raebareli.” Rahul went on to add that during the Congress-led UPA government, both he and his mother worked extensively for their respective constituencies.

When dad went to Amethi, he worked a lot,” Rahul said. As for his achievements in Amethi, the Congress leader listed greater road connectivity, encouraging women’s self-help groups and establishing a petroleum institute and CRPF training camps.

The Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology, in Jais, Amethi, is a training and education institute focusing on STEM and the petroleum industry under IIT Kanpur.

Rahul added, “My plan is similar for Rae Bareli… to connect it with the rest of the country, bring manufacturing units, a strategy for food processing, listen to people’s hearts and do things.”

Rahul said Amethi and Rae Bareli were equally important for him. “In Rae Bareli, I will take forward what Ma and Dadi did. That relation is altogether different. Like I have a relation with my mother and sister, my relation with people there is similar,” he said.

(Edited by Tikli Basu)

Also read: AAP admits Kejriwal aide ‘misbehaved’ with Swati Maliwal, but rift brewing for months