Just about the entire upper leadership of the Congress, including the party’s two Chief Ministers, Ashok Gehlot, and Bhupesh Baghel, as well as its Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs, will congregate at the AICC headquarters on Monday, the day Rahul Gandhi is set to speak before the Enforcement Directorate.

A solidarity demonstration to the ED headquarters is planned, as are sit-ins outside the ED office premises in the respective state capitals.

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The Enforcement Directorate invited Rahul Gandhi in relation to a money laundering case involving the National Herald newspaper.

According to a letter sent to all CWC members by AICC general secretary in charge of Organization K C Venugopal, Rahul Gandhi has “agreed” to appear before the ED and has requested them to be present at the AICC headquarters in solidarity with him in his quest for justice in the “fabricated” case.

When the Gandhis testified before the Patiala House court in the National Herald case in 2015, the party staged an identical show of force.

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The party staged press conferences in different locations on Sunday, criticising the BJP administration for its “vendetta politics.” Vivek Tankha was in Raipur, Sanjay Nirupam in Shimla, Ranjeet Ranjan in Chandigarh, Syed Nasseer Hussain in Patna, Pawan Khera in Ahmedabad, and Alka Lamba in Dehradun.

Party leaders said the planned march to the ED will go ahead as planned, despite the fact that party chief Sonia Gandhi has been admitted to a hospital owing to complications from a Covid infection. “The protest will go ahead as planned,” said a top leader.

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“There is not an iota of illegal activity. Despite this, Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi were served notices by the ED out of political vendetta, with the aim to gain some headlines for a week, ” the national spokesperson for the party Pawan Khera claimed to reporters in Ahmedabad.

“I speak as a Congress member and an advocate,” senior leader P Chidambaram stated. “The ED’s summons to Rahul Gandhi under PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) is baseless.”