Rahul Gandhi, the President of the Indian National Congress (INC,) is all set to fight against three namesakes from the Wayanad constituency.
Gandhi filed his nomination from the Wayanad constituency on the 4th of April. He is going to contest against K.E. Rahul Gandhi from Kottayam, K. Raghul Gandhi from Coimbatore (and a member of Agila India Makkal Kazhagam party) and K.M. Shivaprasad Gandhi, an independent candidate.
Speaking about K.E. Rahul Gandhi’s nomination, local Panchayat member Prakash Pulikkal said, “Kunjumon was a Congress worker and hence named his sons Rahul and Rajiv. The sons have no links to the Congress, but Rajiv is a CPM follower. Their mother Valsamma is a daily worker. I think he has not consulted anyone at home. Everyone in their locality was surprised to hear about the candidature.”
This is not the first time namesakes have filed nominations in Kerala. In the past, individuals with the same names as their opponents contested the elections to confuse the voters. Post filing the nominations, the namesakes went into hiding till the elections were done.
To prevent this from happening during these elections, the Election Commission, for this year’s Lok Sabha elections, introduced photographs on the Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs,) for the first time ever.
However, with these new nominations from the Wayanad district, it looks like Rahul Gandhi is going to have quite a competition at his hands.
Kerala will conduct its Lok Sabha elections for 20 seats, on the 23rd of April.
Starting from the 11th of April and ending on the 19th of May, the seven phased Lok Sabha elections are going to be one of the largest elections held in India to date.
The results are going to be announced on the 23rd of May.
Stay tuned for updates about the Lok Sabha elections.
