“Why should I be scared of anyone? I am Indira Gandhi’s daughter-in-law, I am not scared of anyone,” said a confident Sonia Gandhi as her party members blocked both houses of Parliament.
The statement came out after Delhi Court granted temporary relief to Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her Son Rahul Gandhi, saying so court asked both political leaders to personally show up on 19th December. On the other side congress party member blocked functioning of parliament session, alleging that re-opening of case is politically motivated.
However, senior members of central government including finance minister Arun Jaitley and parliamentary president Venkaiya Naidu gave their individual version, “the case is with court and government has no say in the functioning of court.”
As the day progressed, party vice-president, Rahul Gandhi called developments in the case as “political vendetta”.
While, visiting rain-hit Pondicherry, Rahul said, “I absolutely see a political vendetta. This is the way the central government works.” adding to this he said “Centre thinks they can stop me from asking questions about them by “vendetta” politics. That is not going to happen.”
The summons had been issued on petition by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy who accused the Gandhis of illegally acquiring property worth crores belonging to the now-defunct National Herald newspaper.
During the hearing, Swamy objected to the exemption, saying, “They (the Gandhis ) were informed about the date of appearance in advance, this is no ground for personal exemption”.
Abhishek Manu Singhvi , senior advocate and congress leader in his conversation with media said “Ruling party in power is using proxy litigation to attack senior Congress persons out of political malice. This is political vendetta at its worst, Dr.Swamy, the complainant, is a senior member of the BJP central committee. We believe the case has no legs to stand upon and we shall fight it within the confines of the law.”
There are four other accused in the case — Suman Dubey, Moti Lal Vohra, Oscar Fernandez and Sam Pitroda. Rahul is also scheduled to leave for Chennai on Tuesday to take stock of flood relief.
Swamy has alleged cheating and breach of trust in the acquisition of Associated Journals Limited (AJL) – the publisher of National Herald – by a company called Young India Limited (YIL), in which the Gandhis reportedly hold shares.
