New Delhi: The Congress on Saturday braced for the mega opposition show of strength in Delhi on March 31 where INDIA bloc leaders will come together to “Save the Constitution” allegedly under attack from the BJP and said it was not to protect one person.
This is the second such show of strength since the March 17 INDIA rally in Mumbai which marked the culmination of Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Nyay Yatra.
A day before the event, the Congress managers took care that the Sunday rally got branded as an opposition unity show over an attempt by the AAP to paint it as a protest against founder and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s arrest in the alleged liquor scam.
“Tomorrow’s rally is not linked to one person. Therefore, it is being called a ‘Save the Constitution’ rally. Secondly, this is not a rally of one party but of the INDIA bloc. There are 27-28 parties attending the rally. This is not a rally to protect one person but to protect the Constitution of India. There are four planks of the rally, price rise and rising economic inequalities, corruption in electoral bonds, misuse of central agencies to target the opposition leaders and the threat to the Constitution. The BJP says the existing Constitution has served its purpose and there is a need to change it,” AICC communications in charge Jairam Ramesh said.
According to Congress insiders, if the focus remained on one issue, the message of opposition show of unity would be lost.
“This is a time for us to be seen together against the Centre’s moves which are undemocratic. We should be able to collectively send a message from Delhi. Of course, Kejriwal’s arrest is one of the issues of protest but there are other issues as well,” AICC in charge of Delhi Dipak Babaria told ETV Bharat.
“We have an alliance with AAP in Delhi but not in Punjab. We don’t have an alliance with TMC in West Bengal yet but they will attend the rally,” he said.
The Congress, which has been helming the INDIA bloc since its inception last year, has been mobilizing support for the March 31 rally. AICC in charge of organization KC Venugopal discussed the rally arrangements along with AICC in charge of Delhi and Haryana Dipak Babaria recently to prepare for the mega protest.
“We urge the people of Delhi to reach the venue of the rally in large numbers. The BJP is resorting to undemocratic means and we have to oppose it. The other parties too are mobilizing support for the rally,” Delhi Congress chief Arvinder Singh Lovely said.
Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, former chief Rahul Gandhi, NCP SP leader Sharad Pawar, Shiv Sena UBT chief Uddhav Thackeray, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, RJD’s Tejaswi Yadav, CPI-M’s Sitaram Yechury, NC’s Farooq Abdullah, PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti, DMK’s Tiruchi Siva, TMC’s Derek O’Brien, Jharkhand chief minister Champai Soren and CPI-ML leader Dipankar Bhattacharya will attend the Sunday rally being held at the iconic Ramlila Grounds.
For the Congress, the Sunday rally is also a chance to flag the lack of level playing field in the midst of the parliamentary elections due to sealing of the party’s bank accounts and a slew of tax notices worth around Rs 1,800 crore.
“We have received two more IT department notices on March 29. Before that we had received four such notices. Now the situation is such that if we don’t get a notice a day, we wonder why. Maybe we will get a notice on Sunday morning as well,” said Ramesh.
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