Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was questioned for three hours at the ED office after leading a protest march to the federal agency’s headquarters with a sea of his followers and other party officials. Earlier today, a number of Congress workers demonstrating outside the party’s headquarters in Delhi were held ahead of his grilling in the National Herald-AJL case. The issue involves charges of financial irregularities following the acquisition of Associated Journals Limited (AJL), which produced the daily, by Gandhi-owned Young Indian Limited in 2010.
Gandhi remained in the ED office here till 9 p.m., having entered at 11.10 a.m., accompanied by a battery of leaders including sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and escorted by armed CRPF officers, then left for an 80-minute break in the afternoon. Hundreds of Congress activists came to the streets in Delhi and state capitals, and many top politicians, including Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel, Randeep Surjewala, and K C Venugopal, were detained.
The opposition party said that police mistreated several of its officials and chastised the administration for ‘not permitting’ peaceful protests. The BJP slammed the Congress, accusing senior leaders of exerting pressure on the ED, encouraging corruption, and sheltering the Gandhi family’s suspected assets worth Rs 2,000 crore. Noting that ‘no one is above the law, not even Rahul Gandhi,’ BJP leader and Union Minister Smriti Irani stated that a political family has never previously attempted to hold an investigation agency to ransom in order to safeguard its ‘ill-gotten’ riches.
Gandhi, 51, drove in a convoy of seven automobiles from the party headquarters on Akbar Road to the ED office in central Delhi, a few kilometres away, at about 11.10 a.m., after walking for some distance with his followers. He left the ED office for lunch after roughly two and a half hours and returned at 3.30 p.m. According to official sources, the former Congress president, who became a Z+ category CRPF protectee after the Union government revoked the Gandhi family’s SPG protection in 2019, is anticipated to put down his testimony. Prohibition orders were issued in strongly fortified areas of central Delhi.
The ED is recording the Lok Sabha member from Wayanad in Kerala’s remarks under criminal provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The investigation is connected to suspected financial irregularities in the Young Indian daily, which is owned by the party-backed Associated Journals Limited (AJL). Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are among Young Indian promoters and stockholders. Rahul Gandhi will be questioned regarding the formation of the Young Indian firm, the operations of the National Herald, and the movement of funds inside the news media organisation.
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