The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday summoned Congress president Sonia Gandhi and party MP Rahul Gandhi in a money laundering case related to National Herald, news agency PTI reported.
The Congress hit out at the Centre over the development and said that the Narendra Modi government was trying to muzzle the Opposition’s voice just as the British tried to do with National Herald.
“Started the National Herald newspaper in 1942, at that time the British tried to suppress it, today Modi govt is also doing the same & ED is being used for this. ED has given notice to our president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi,” Congress spokesperson Randeep Surjewala was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.
The I-T probe against the Gandhis was necessitated after BJP leader Subramanian Swamy had filed a complaint against the Congress leaders before a Delhi trial court in 2013. In his complaint, Swamy had alleged that there was cheating and misappropriation of funds involved in the Gandhis’ acquisition of National Herald’s properties. He had further alleged that the Gandhis had completed the act by acquiring the newspaper’s former publishers through Young Indian Pvt Ltd, where the Gandhis held majority stake.
In the complaint, Swamy further stated that the Gandhis along with others, recovered Rs 90.25 crore that Associated Journal Ltd (AJL), owner of National Herald, owed to the party after Young Indian, which was incorporated with a capital of only Rs 50 lakh, had acquired nearly all of AJL’s shareholding.
In 2018, the I-T had asked the Young Indian Pvt Ltd, where the Gandhis hold 86% stake, to pay income tax on the income of the company. The company moved Delhi High Court and filed a plea to put a stay on I-T’s Rs 249.15 crore proceedings against it. Rejecting the plea, the HC ordered the company to pay Rs 10 crore.