ED hunts for Congress leaders; Rahul Gandhi vows to ‘fight intimidation’
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, August 4: The Enforcement Directorate is doggedly pushing ahead with its investigations in the National Herald case, throwing nets far wide by now dragging the leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjuna Kharge for the marathon interrogation on Thursday amid the ongoing Monsoon session of Parliament.
Predictably, both the Houses of Parliament plunged into pandemonium after a day of normalcy in the Rajya Sabha.
Both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha were rocked by the Congress MPs vociferously protesting the “misuse of the ED for the political purposes”.
The ED, acting on the prevention of money laundering charges against the top Congress leadership, is seemingly breathing fire after the Supreme Court upheld its powers through the amendments in the law, which had previously been given enough biting teeth in 2005 by the UPA government.
Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi on his return from Karnataka where he has taken ‘Deeksha form Lingayat seers’ told the reporters that “we will not be intimidated, and the Modi government can do what it wishes to do”.
Kharge, incidentally, was to host a dinner for the MPs of the Opposition parties for the vice presidential candidate at 7.30 PM on Thursday, but the Congress media head Jairam Ramesh said that the leader of the Opposition was subjected to over five hours long interrogation.
The ED in fact had sealed a part of the offices of the National Herald building situated on the Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg in the Central Delhi.
The Congress working president Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi have already appeared before the ED on multiple occasions for long hours.
The ED officials have been claiming that the Congress leaders are not cooperating in the investigation.
The ED is already seen in the political circle to be on a warpath against the Opposition leaders, ensuring that some of the prominent names such as Sanjay Rout of the Shiv Sena, Partha Chaterjee of the Trinamool Congress, Nawab Malik of the Nationalist Congress Party are in the judicial custody.
It may be known that getting bails in the PMLA charges is a daunting task as had been the case with the former Union Minister P Chidambaram.
The ED heat on the Congress leadership is likely to gain more ammunition in the coming days, with the Monsoon session of parliament concluding next week.
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