The talk in the party circles is that Captain Satish Sharma, who is close to the party’s first family, may be the candidate. Sharma had contested in 2004 too and lost to the BSP.

For several months, Sanjay Singh has been visiting villages, introducing himself as the Congress candidate because “at the time of delimitation, Soniaji had asked me to start preparing for contesting from this seat.” He said he has visited 800 villages. But UPCC spokesman Akhilesh Pratap Singh refused to confirm that Sanjay Singh was the party candidate. “All matters of Rae Bareli and Sultanpur districts are handled at Soniaji’s level. So I can’t say anything about Sultanpur. Even organisational work of the party in the two districts is subject to the high command,” he added.

Lately, the party has started its groundwork in Sultanpur on the pattern of Amethi. “We have formed committees at three levels - gram panchayat, nayaya panchayat and prakhand panchayat. These function directly under Rahul Gandhi and the functionaries are Rahul’s team members,” said a party leader in Sultanpur.

Core members of the Rahul team that works in Amethi have been tasked to select youths from different assembly segments of

Sultanpur. “They interviewed the youths and selected them to head committees at gram panchayat and nayaya panchayat levels,” the leader said.

In Amethi, these youth teams keep Rahul Gandhi informed about the problems of the people. “As he is very busy, he can’t personally find out the problems of voters. The functionaries represent Rahul at the ground level,” said a party source. Plus, Rahul has appointed a lieutenant — Deepak Singh of Amethi — as the in-charge of the constituency. Deepak said his job was to strengthen the party in Sultanpur.

The district Congress committee president of Sultanpur, Maqsud Aalam, said they were now forming booth committees.