New Delhi, Oct. 7 -- Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, MP, were detained for the second time in two days on Wednesday as the Opposition's street protests continued against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
Both Rahul and Priyanka were stopped near the Shangri-La hotel while heading towards Jantar Mantar. Priyanka resisted as police moved to detain her, eventually lying on the ground, clutching the Constitution to her chest, before being carried into a police van. Congress alleged she was pushed and manhandled.
Giving further momentum to his politics of street protest, Rahul Gandhi led INDIA bloc leaders to another resistance-packed day -- moving from the opposition grouping's lunch meeting to near Jantar Mantar in a procession of buses for a surprise dharna. But for the second day, police stalled the planned anti-CEC protests midway, forcibly detaining him and other leaders.
"We are not going to stop protesting till (Chief Election Commissioner) Gyanesh Kumar resigns. This is a fight to protect the most sacred thing in this country. There is nothing that Narendra Modi and Amit Shah can do that will stop us," Gandhi said.
There were several dramatic moments in the nearly three-hour-long bus procession and an impromptu sit-in at the roundabout in front of the Shangri-La hotel when the opposition MPs were stopped by security personnel, with Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra lying flat on her back on the street, clutching a copy of the Constitution, along with other women leaders.
Rahul Gandhi kept resisting police attempts to put him inside a van for detention. The INDIA bloc leaders also jostled with security personnel.
A day after INDIA bloc MPs' march from Parliament and Rahul Gandhi's sit-in at Akashvani Bhawan, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge hosted the lunch for the MPs of the alliance at a South Indian restaurant at Janpath, seen by many as a show of solidarity and a cover for launching another street protest.
The MPs converged at the all-vegetarian Sagar Ratna. The lunch began at 1:30 PM with opposition MPs congregating for a second straight day.
After about one-and-a-half hours, the MPs streamed out of the eatery and went and sat in three buses parked on Janpath Road and headed towards Jantar Mantar.
Some Congress leaders, including Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, Imran Masood, Imran Pratapgarhi, Deepender Hooda and Srinivas B V climbed the roof of the bus in which Kharge, Rahul and Priyanka were travelling, and waved the tricolour, as the procession crawled from Janpath to Jantar Mantar, bringing the high security area to a halt for the second day.
However, the buses were stopped by a multi-layered security cordon at Ashoka Road, after travelling a kilometre, near the Shangri-La hotel, barely another kilometre away from the Jantar Mantar protest site.
MPs of the Congress, TMC, CPI-M, CPI, RJD, IUML and some other parties were among the protesters. The Samajwadi Party was unrepresented at an INDIA bloc lunch, with the Congress attributing the absence of some allies to short notice.
However, SP sources separately voiced concerns over a lack of consultation ahead of Rahul Gandhi's surprise protests. Representatives of the Shiv Sena (UBT) and NCP-SP also could not attend because of prior commitments.
Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said all parties of the INDIA bloc had been invited, but the decision and communication came late on Tuesday night.
Before embarking on the bus ride, Gandhi spoke to the media and said, "Today, we feel that we will protest at Jantar Mantar, which is a designated protest site, and tell the country that for us Gyanesh Kumar is not a legitimate Election Commissioner."
Asked about an FIR being registered against him for entering the Akashvani Bhawan premises and staging an eight-hour sit-in there, Gandhi said, "I have 45 FIRs against me. My target is that there should be 100 FIRs against me. Every FIR against me is a medal for me."
Kharge said the Election Commission is making mistakes and "Modi ji is getting these mistakes done".
"We have decided that we will together take the voice of the people to the country. We will tell the people that their rights are being taken away. We are working hard to protest those rights of people. We are all united and will continue to fight against this government," the Congress chief said.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.