Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Aug 5: Wearing black clothes Congress leaders hit the streets on Friday to protest against price rise and unemployment and the police refusing permission to march up to the Rashtrapati Bhavan detained a host of them including the Gandhi siblings, Rahul and Priyanka.
Videos released by the Congress showed that many of the leaders including Priyanka Gandhi were dragged into the police vehicles dragging some of them to the police vehicles from outside the AICC headquarters in Delhi. Priyanka Gandhi is also heard saying in the video, “The government thinks it can silence us. It thinks that by showing us this (police) force, it can make us quietly sit in buses… But we have a purpose.”
Amid dramatic standoffs outside Parliament and the AICC headquarters in New Delhi, the Congress MPs, including former party chief Rahul Gandhi, staged a protest in the Parliament House complex and then proceeded to take out a march towards the Rashtrapati Bhavan as part of the party’s nationwide stir against price rise, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) hike on essential items and unemployment.
The protesting MPs of the opposition party raised slogans against the government demanding that the GST hike on essential items be withdrawn, with party chief Sonia Gandhi standing with the women MPs holding a banner outside gate number 1 of Parliament. She did not participate in the march.
The Congress had similarly taken out protest rallies in different state capitals and district headquarters in different parts of the country to protest against the inflationary trend in the economy.
Dressed in black like other party leaders as a mark of protest, Priyanka Gandhi had climbed over barricades to reach the spot. She held a brief sit-in before being forcibly taken away by cops. Police had denied permission for the protest, citing law and order.
Before pulling Priyanka Gandhi into a vehicle, police were seen trying to persuade her to end the protest. But she refused to move, gesturing to cops that she has a right to protest.
Police had barricaded key areas to disallow the protest plan, which included marches to the Prime Minister’s house and Rashtrapati Bhavan. Prohibitory orders, banning large gatherings in parts of Delhi ahead of the Congress march, had already been announced by the administration. Citing these restrictions, police had denied permission for the protest.
Ahead of the protest, Rahul Gandhi said, “We’re witnessing the death of democracy.” “What India has built brick by brick, starting almost a century ago, is being destroyed in front of your eyes. Anybody who stands against this idea of onset of dictatorship is viciously attacked, jailed, arrested and beaten up,” he said. The BJP retorted with a jibe, asking if there’s democracy within the Congress, calling it a “dynastic” party.
Congress MPs, including former party chief Rahul Gandhi, staged a protest in the Parliament House complex and then proceeded to take out a march towards the Rashtrapati Bhavan as part of the party’s nationwide stir against price rise, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) hike on essential items and unemployment.
The protesting MPs of the opposition party raised slogans against the government demanding that the GST hike on essential items be withdrawn, with party chief Sonia Gandhi standing with the women MPs holding a banner outside gate number 1 of Parliament.
Rahul Gandhi, senior Congress leaders K C Venugopal, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Gaurav Gogoi were among the 64 MPs detained and taken away from Vijay Chowk in a police bus, party sources said.
Talking to reporters at Vijay Chowk, Rahul Gandhi said “democracy is being murdered.” Asked if the MPs were manhandled, he answered in the affirmative. “Our job is to resist these forces, our job is to ensure that democracy in India is protected, our job is to raise the issues of people. We are doing that,” the former Congress chief said. He alleged that some of the party MPs were even “beaten up” by police.
Posting pictures from the protest at Vijay Chowk, Rahul Gandhi tweeted: “Democracy is a memory.” Earlier, in a tweet in Hindi, he said, “This dictatorial government is scared. From the condition of India, from the back-breaking inflation and historic unemployment, from the ruin brought by his policies, the one who is afraid of the truth threatens those who raise their voice!”
