NEW DELHI, 18 April 2006 — India’s Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi yesterday filed papers for re-election to the national Parliament which she quit last month in the wake of accusations that she wrongfully held two salaried posts.
Sonia, dressed in a blue-bordered cream cotton sari, submitted her nomination papers in the Rae Bareli parliamentary constituency, 110 kilometers (68 miles) from Lucknow, capital of the politically strategic northern state of Uttar Pradesh.
Sonia’s two children — son Rahul, who is a member of the national Parliament, and daughter Priyanka — looked on as the 59-year-old Italian-born leader signed three sets of papers for re-election.
Rae Bareli has been the electoral bastion of India’s charismatic Nehru-Gandhi dynasty for decades and Sonia won the seat in 2004 with a thumping 300,000 majority over her nearest rival. Her re-election is seen as little more than a formality.
Sonia quit as a member of Parliament on March 23 amid right-wing opposition charges that she wrongfully held a second salaried government post.
The constitution disqualifies an MP “if he holds any office of profit under the federal government or government of any state, other than an office declared by the national legislature by law not to disqualify its holder.” Immediately after quitting as MP, she also resigned as chairwoman of several trusts named after her slain husband and mother-in-law, former Prime Ministers Rajiv Gandhi and Indira Gandhi.
Sonia is credited with scripting the Congress party’s surprise victory that brought it back to power in 2004 at the head of a left-leaning coalition.
Dusty Rae Bareli yesterday sported flower-decked arches and colorful banners as Sonia drove through in a convoy. She stopped at several places en route to the local administator’s office, waving at the crowds.
