|HT|
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday issued fresh summons to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in the National Herald newspaper case. Gandhi has now been asked to appear before the ED on June 13. Gandhi was asked to appear on June 2 but the Congress MP from Wayanad sought a fresh date as he was out of India. "Rahul Gandhi is expected to be back home by June 5 after which he will seek another date from the ED for questioning in a money laundering case," Congress sources earlier said on condition of anonymity. Apart from Rahul Gandhi, his mother and Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi was also summoned by the ED in the National Herald case on June 8. On Thursday, party general secretary Randeep Surjewala said that Sonia Gandhi tested positive for Covid-19 but will appear before the ED on the given date. The National Herald case pertains to the alleged misappropriation of assets of over ₹2,000 crore in an equity transaction. Specifically, the ED has been probing Associate Journals Ltd, the National Herald's holding company and some Congress leaders under the anti-money laundering law since 2016 after taking cognisance of a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) case.
Before Rahul and Sonia Gandhi, the central agency had recently questioned senior Congress leaders Pawan Bansal and Mallikarjun Kharge as part of the investigation. The Congress has ruled out any fraud and claimed that the ED closed the case in 2015 and was only re-opening it at the behest of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The grand old party also accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of hatching a "cowardly conspiracy" against Rahul and Sonia.
"The BJP is using puppet agencies to intimidate political opponents..." senior Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi told reporters after the summons was issued.
"In 2015, the ED closed the National Herald case. But the government didn't like it and it removed the ED officials concerned, brought in new officials and reopened the case. This is to divert attention from inflation and other raging problems," he added.
(Except for the headline and the pictorial description, this story has not been edited by THE DEN staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)