With the Enforcement Directorate questioning Congress President Sonia Gandhi for a third day today, her party has gone into protest mode full throttle, its top leaders and workers hitting the streets. However, the principal opposition party’s protests are marked by a careful articulation of its concerns to not appear limited to defending its first family.
The party has emphasised Sonia’s standing in the political set-up, her age and her health condition to emphasise Narendra Modi’s government’s alleged ruthlessness in what it describes as its attempts to target political opponents by allegedly misusing investigating agencies.
Party leaders have asked why the senior, highly respected woman politician has been summoned to the office of the Enforcement Directorate and why the sleuths of the agency could not question her at her residence.
However, the party realises that its claims that the Modi regime is acting out of a sense of political vendetta have limited traction amongst the people. It is aware of the criticism by its political opponents that it has taken to the streets only to protect its first family and that the agitation does not have anything to do with the welfare of the people. Responding to the Congress terming its protests a ‘Satyagraha’, the BJP has said it is rather a ‘Soniagraha’.
Based on an assessment of the limited nature of the impact of its line that its top leadership is being targeted, the party has worked on a carefully crafted response that attempts to link the questioning by the ED to the government’s alleged efforts to silence the opposition leaders, who are questioning its policies.
This was evident in the issues raised by the protesting Congress leaders and workers. Their protests are not limited to the claims of political vendetta. The party has raised equally vociferously, issues such as price rise and the imposition of Goods and Services Tax on food items.
As Congress MPs protested outside Parliament today, they held a giant banner that read ‘Stop Misuse of ED’. However, right above the big banner was a small placard held by an MP that said ‘Logon Ko Lootna Band Karo’ (Stop robbing the people), an apparent reference to price rise and the imposition of GST on articles of everyday use. A little distance behind, party MPs held aloft placards decrying the increase in rates of domestic LPG and levying GST on food items.
The questioning of Sonia by the ED comes in the middle of a stormy Monsoon Session of Parliament, where the government and the opposition have been at loggerheads over the latter’s demand to discuss price rise and GST. Four MPs of the Congress have been suspended from the Lok Sabha for the remainder of the Monsoon Session of Parliament for what the party terms is their insistence on discussing price rise and GST in the House. Against this backdrop, the party has tried to link the issue of ED interrogation with the government’s alleged refusal to discuss issues of the people on the floor of the House.