Rahul Gandhi wins from Rae Bareli, Wayanad: What happens after a candidate wins from two seats in Lok Sabha Elections?

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has won both the seats he had contested from in the 18th Lok Sabha Elections. He had won from both Rae Bareli in Uttar Pradesh and Wayanad in Kerala. Now what happens next for an MP in such a situation?

It is legal for candidates to run from two Lok Sabha seats in India. A by-election will be held in the vacated constituency if a candidate wins both. They are required to vacate one seat within fourteen days of the result declaration according to the Representation of the People Act, 1951's.

In addition to Rahul Gandhi, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik ran in the concurrent assembly elections from two seats: Kantabani and Hinjili. While he lost in Kantabanji, he was victorious in Hinjili.

In Indian elections, running for two seats is a typical occurrence. In the past, during the Lok Sabha elections of 1996, former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee ran from the seats of Gandhinagar and Lucknow. There had to be a by-election in Gandhinagar since he had won both seats but decided to hold onto the one in Lucknow.

Similarly, Sonia Gandhi, the former president of the Congress, ran for office in 1999 from Bellary, Karnataka, and Amethi, Uttar Pradesh.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi stood for office in the 2014 general elections from Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, and Vadodara, Gujarat. Despite winning both seats, he decided to keep Varanasi.

A petition challenging Section 33(7) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 was filed in 2023 by counsel Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay. Upadhyay argued and attempted to declare this provision unlawful. The petition demanded action from the Election Commission and the Center to stop candidates from concurrently competing for the same post in several constituencies.