There is speculation that Rahul Gandhi may also contest from Amethi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra from Rae Bareli, a seat which was previously held by Sonia Gandhi.Both the seats are considered bastions of the Gandhi family and the local units of the Congress have demanded that the two scions of the Congress first family should contest from there.Rahul Gandhi, who was previously an MP from Amethi, lost the seat in 2019 but won from Wayanad in Kerala.DK Suresh (Bangalore Rural) and Kannada actor Shivarajkumar’s wife Geetha Shivarajkumar (Shimoga) figure in the first list of seven candidates in Karnataka announced on Friday by the Congress for the coming Lok Sabha elections.A three-time MP, Suresh is the brother of Karnataka Congress chief D K Shivakumar and is the sitting member from Bangalore Rural. He was the only Congress candidate to win in the 2019 general elections in the State.The other five candidates are: H R Algur (Bijapur), Anandswamy Gaddadevarmath (Haveri), S P Muddahanumegowda (Tumkur), Venkataramane Gowda (Mandya) and Shreyas M Patel (Hassan).The party naming Geetha Shivarajkumar for the Shivamogga seat seems to have set the stage for an interesting battle in the home district of BJP veteran B S Yediyurappa.Geetha, daughter of former Chief Minister late S Bangarappa, contested the 2014 Lok Sabha elections in Shivamogga (Shimoga) on a Janata Dal (Secular) ticket and lost to Yediyurappa.The seat is currently held by Yediyurappa’s son, BY Raghavedra.Geetha, sister of Karnataka Minister for School Education Madhu Bangarappa and daughter-in- law of Kannada thespian late Rajkumar, joined the Congress in April last year ahead of Assembly elections in Karnataka.Venkataramane Gowda, also known as Star Chandru, is a contractor by profession.The Mandya seat is represented by Sumalatha Ambareesh, an independent backed by the BJP.The Congress had denied renomination to Muddahanumegowda in the 2019 elections to make way for Congress-JD(S) alliance candidate HD Deve Gowda who, however, lost the polls.Muddahanumegowda officially joined the BJP in 2022 but kept a low profile. He returned to the Congress fold only last month.”Congress has named candidates in segments where there was no confusion over the nominee,” a party leader said.The BJP-JD(S) combine is yet to come out with its list of candidates.
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