Acharya Krishnam calls Priyanka "victim of conspiracy by family, party" after Cong fields Rahul from Raebareli

Claiming that Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was deliberately denied a ticket to contest the Lok Sabha elections after the party announced Rahul Gandhi and KL Sharma as its candidates from Raebareli and Amethi; expelled leader Acharya Pramod Krishnam on Friday said she was a "victim of family and party conspiracy".

Claiming that Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was deliberately denied a ticket to contest the Lok Sabha elections after the party announced Rahul Gandhi and KL Sharma as its candidates from Raebareli and Amethi; expelled leader Acharya Pramod Krishnam on Friday said she was a "victim of family and party conspiracy". "I said this earlier that Rahul Gandhi will not contest Amethi. I said this, too, that Rahul Gandhi will not let Priyanka Gandhi Vadra fight these elections. There is a big conspiracy afoot against Priyanka. She is the victim of a conspiracy hatched by her family and the party," Acharya Krishnam told ANI on Friday.

"We know how Rahul Gandhi ran away from Amethi. Any other leader in his place, who takes decisions after carefully weighing his credibility and acceptability, would have considered contesting directly against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi if he did not wish from Amethi," Acharya Krishnam said. Rahul Gandhi, who was expected to make an all-out bid to win back Amethi, was announced earlier in the day as the Congress' nominee from Raebareli, the seat vacated recently by his mother Sonia Gandhi, who took membership of the Rajya Sabha from Jaipur.

Rahul is pitted against Congress defector and three-time MLC Dinesh Pratap Singh in Raebareli. A sitting MP from Kerala's Wayanad, Rahul is also seeking a fresh term in the Lower House from the seat that polled in Phase 2 of the general elections on April 26.

In Amethi, the family bastion that fell to the BJP five years ago, in 2019; the Congress will be represented by Kishori Lal Sharma, a longtime loyalist of the Gandhi family. The voting in both seats will be held in the fifth phase of the seven-phase Lok Sabha elections on May 7. (ANI)

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