‘Rahul restricted SPG personnel cover on personal trips abroad’

New Delhi: In a tectonic shift, the Special Protection Group (SPG) has amended its guidelines for protectees trips abroad, making it mandatory for highly trained commandos to accompany them at all times whenever they travel abroad.
The fresh guidelines were issued after the SPG red-flagged the Gandhi family’s trips abroad where the security personnel were sent back many times from the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) here.
The SPG currently guards the Congress interim President Sonia Gandhi, her son Rahul Gandhi, and daughter Priyanka Gandhi Vadra.
Official sources here said this decision was taken after the SPG complained that former Congress President Rahul Gandhi was not allowing SPG personnel to accompany him from IGIA during his personal visits.
“SPG personnel had accompanied him only on those visits when he had an official engagement and that trip was further communicated to the Lok Sabha Speaker and Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs,” said a source.
A top Indian Police Srvice (IPS) officer said that Rahul Gandhi never allowed SPG personnel to accompany him during his personal trips abroad. The sources here said that the SPG were also not kept in the loop about his whereabouts. According to them, the Indian missions were informed by Gandhi family “only on a need to know basis”.