Cong steps up attack on BJP ahead of Rahul Gandhi’s appearance before ED

New Delhi: A day before Rahul Gandhi is scheduled to appear before the Enforcement Directorate in connection with a money laundering case, the Congress on Sunday accused the ruling BJP of indulging in vendetta politics while asserting the former party chief “won’t back down”.
The Congress has decided that all its top leaders and MPs would take out a protest march to the agency headquarters here and stage a “satyagraha” against what the party termed “misuse” of the ED by the Centre.
In an interview with PTI, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram asserted the summons to the former party chief was “baseless” and said it appears that the ED’s jurisdiction does not extend to the BJP members or to states ruled by it.
About the ED summons to Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi and the Congress’ decision of a show of strength when the former appears before the probe agency on Monday, Chidambaram said, “I speak as a Congress member and an advocate. The ED’s summons to Rahul Gandhi under PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) is baseless.” Pointing out that the offence of money laundering requires ‘money’ and “laundering of money”, the former home minister said in the National Herald debt-to-equity conversion, something which lending banks do on a regular basis, there was no transaction of money.
Therefore, how can there be money laundering, he posed.