NEW DELHI Underlining her party's support for former prime minister Manmohan Singh, who has been summoned as an accused in the coal scam case, Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday led a march — which included the party top echelon — to Singh's residence.
A special court had summoned Singh, industrialist Kumar Mangalam Birla, ex-coal secretary P C Parakh and three others as accused in a case pertaining to allocation of Talabira-II coal block in Odisha in 2005 and asked them to appear before it on April 8.
Gandhi collected leaders at the party headquarters on Akbar Road early in the morning and marched to Singh's residence, located about half a kilometre away.
Several of Singh's erstwhile cabinet colleagues, including P Chidambaram, Anand Sharma, Ambika Soni and Veerappa Moily were present.
Congress leaders also accused the government of maintaining a "studied silence" after the Central Bureau of Investigation had told the court there was no criminality involved in the allocation of Talabira coal blocks II to Aditya Birla group company Hindalco in 2005. At the time, Singh also held the coal portfolio.
"I was outraged at the news that summons had been served to Manmohan Singh," Gandhi told reporters at Singh's residence.
"The former PM is known not only in our country but throughout the world as a person of integrity and probity. We are here to offer our unstinted support, our solidarity. The Congress party is fully behind him. We shall fight this legally and with all our means at our command. We are sure, we are convinced that he will be vindicated."
Singh, who received the delegation with his wife Gursharan Kaur, thanked the party and Sonia Gandhi for showing solidarity.
"The Congress party, Soniaji and all members of the working committee and senior leaders have come to my residence, expressed solidarity with me and we will fight this case to the best of our ability," he said.
RAHUL EXTENDS SABBATICAL
NEW DELHI Rahul Gandhi has yet again extended his sabbatical. The Congress vice-president will now return only by the end of March, sources said on Thursday. Gandhi was to have returned to Delhi by Tuesday, March 10, but Congress sources said then that he had extended his "leave of absence" till the end of this week. The new extension means that he will not be in Delhi to lead the Congress when opposition lawmakers march to Rashtrapati Bhavan on Tuesday next in protest against the government's land reforms.
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