Cong's first list out for UP game-changer: Sonia from Rae Bareli, Rahul from Amethi

NEW DELHI: The Congress on Thursday evening released its first list for the Lok Sabha elections that are just weeks away, naming four candidates in Gujarat and 11 in Uttar Pradesh. While Congress president Rahul Gandhi will contest from his current seat, Amethi, his mother and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi will fight from her constituency, Rae Bareli.

Amethi and Rae Bareli, the Gandhi bastion in Uttar Pradesh, are the only seats Congress had won in the state in the 2014 general elections.

The list of 15 candidates does not include Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who had recently announced her political debut and was made the Congress's General Secretary for UP East.

While senior leader Salman Khursheed will contest from Farrukhabad, where he had contested and lost in 2014, RPN Singh will contest from Kushi Nagar.

The other leaders on the list for UP are Imran Masood from Saharanpur, Jitin Prasad from Dhaurahra, Annu Tandon from Unnao, Rajaram Pal from Akbarpur, Brij Lal Khabri from Jalaun and Nirmal Khatri from Faizabad.

The Congress had recently announced that it will contest all 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh after it was left out of their alliance by Samajwadi Party's Akhilesh Yadav and Bahujan Samaj Party's Mayawati.

In Gujarat, senior Congress leader Bharatsinh Solanki will contest from Anand. He had won the Lok Sabha elections from Anand in 2004 and 2009. But he lost to Dilipbhai Patel of the BJP in 2014.

Raju Parmar will contest the elections from Ahmedabad West seat, Prashant Patel will contest from Vadodara, and Ranjit Mohansinh Rathwa will contest from Chhota Udaipur seat.