New Delhi: Rahul Gandhi will be on the streets asking tough questions against the Centre, a senior Congress leader said on Saturday, a day after the former party chief was disqualified from the Lok Sabha. The disqualification came on March 24 a day after a Surat court sentenced Rahul for 2 years in jail in a defamation case involving PM Modi’s name.
“Rahulji will be on the streets asking the tough questions he has been posing at the central government. He will keep asking about the Adani-PM link. The entire Congress too will be on the streets in Rahulji’s support,” Madhya Pradesh Congress working president and MLA Jitu Patwari told this channel.
“The questions that our leader has been asking relate to the welfare of the common man. We will take his message to every household that people have suffered because of the policies of the central government,” he said. According to Patwari, the Congress is in the process of charting out a detailed protest plan which will be rolled out over the coming days across the country.
The Congress leader said that while the party was clear on the political response to the disqualification, an act of Centre’s vendetta politics, the legal team will take care of the other cases going against Rahul Gandhi in various courts. On the lines of the Surat defamation case, a similar case has been going on in Patna, Bihar where the former Congress chief is expected to appear on April 12.
Also read: Rahul Gandhi to address press- the first after his disqualification
“My sense is that Rahulji has been sentenced in the case. There cannot be separate sentences for the same case filed in two different cities. As far as the legal proceedings, the legal team will take care of those aspects,” said Patwari. Party insiders said they were hopeful that Rahul would get a stay on the conviction order of the Surat trial court when an appeal is filed in the sessions court within the stipulated 30 days.
Patwari said he could not comment on the jail term issue but said for the party the battle for the 2024 national polls has begun. “We will appeal to the people to change the central government for their own betterment. Before 2024, we will change the government in Madhya Pradesh,” he said.
Sources who have worked with Rahul said he is unlikely to apologise over his 2019 remarks which were just political satire and led to his conviction. The nationwide protests will start with a big rally in Delhi on Monday and similar protests will be organised in other states. Party state units have been instructed to ensure maximum publicity to the issues flagged by Rahul, the real reason why he was sentenced and the hurry with which his disqualification as a Lok Sabha member followed.
Party insiders said they fear that the EC may soon announce a by-poll in the Wayanad parliamentary constituency represented by Rahul till March 24 and the move will be challenged in an appropriate court.
